Deal Teardown: A One Bed in Jumeirah Village Circle
A worked example of analyzing a one bedroom apartment in Jumeirah Village Circle, showing how price, rent, service charge, and finance turn into a real return
2026-07-28 · 2 min read
The setup
Take a typical one bedroom apartment in Jumeirah Village Circle, 750 square feet, listed at AED 750,000. JVC is a mid market area where studios and one beds regularly show gross yields above 8 percent. The question is whether this specific unit actually works once all the costs are in
The inputs
- Price: AED 750,000
- Size: 750 sq ft
- Expected rent: AED 60,000 a year
- Service charge: AED 15 per sq ft, so about AED 11,250 a year
- Down payment: 20 percent, financed at 4.5 percent over 25 years
The gross yield
Gross yield is rent divided by price. AED 60,000 on AED 750,000 is 8 percent gross. That is the headline number a broker will quote, and it looks good. But it is not what you keep
The net yield
Strip out the service charge of AED 11,250, a month of vacancy allowance of AED 5,000, and a management fee of 5 percent of rent, AED 3,000. Net operating income is around AED 40,750. On the full price that is about 5.4 percent net. On the cash you actually put in, the 20 percent down payment of AED 150,000 plus costs, the cash on cash return is very different and depends on the mortgage
With finance
The mortgage on AED 600,000 at 4.5 percent over 25 years is roughly AED 38,000 a year. Add the service charge, vacancy, and management, and the property is close to cash flow neutral in year one, with the tenant paying down your principal. The return is then the capital growth plus the principal paydown, not the gross yield
What the analyzer shows
This is exactly what the deal analyzer computes with your real numbers. It shows the buying costs, the monthly cash flow, the mortgage estimate, and the return against the JVC benchmark. The point of the teardown is that an 8 percent gross can be a cash flow neutral financed deal, which is still a good outcome, but only if you see the real numbers before you bid
The lesson
Gross yield sells deals. Net yield and cash flow decide whether they work. In JVC, the service charge and the mortgage rate are the two numbers that move the answer, so check them for the specific building, not the area average. If this unit were listed at AED 690,000, it would cross into below market value territory and the deal would start to look genuinely strong
Check your own property inputs
Enter only the price, loan, rent, and costs you have verified for a specific property.
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