Why Does Dubai Need Real Estate Software Development in 2022?

Digitalization has already become a new reality for our world. Customers, especially the youngest generations, are equally comfortable in both real and virtual realities, if not more in the latest. Enterprises, reacting to this fundamental lifestyle shift, are bound to reflect on the changes and adapt, despite the industry they work in.

The real estate industry is the big one, but even the pretty traditional Dubai market is experiencing a significant inflow of proptech startups and innovative solutions powered by cutting-edge technologies.

More and more people all over the world become interested in becoming real estate owners in UAE. This will definitely boost the industry, bringing more players and opening doors for new ideas, and approaches.

What is happening with Dubai real estate market, what is the real impact of technologies there, and is it a good time to consider real estate software development for your company? Let’s figure it out in this article.

The Real Estate Market in Dubai: Is the Era of PropTech Here?

Dubai’s real estate sector is expanding again, and local experts predict a good outcome for the growth that we currently observe. Trend analysis reports that the investments in the property market will also increase, and it might become a good point to enter the market with tech solutions for real estate agents and brokers, as well as for developers, property owners, and tenants.

Dubai Real Estate Market Report H1 2021, Betterhomes

Though the new technologies penetrate almost every aspect of our lives with breakthrough ideas like Uber or Careem NOW, the real estate industry has become a “late bloomer” here. In Dubai, the proptech only start to take shape. Luckily, the city can boast a great climate that facilitates this digitalization: apart from the inflow of investments, the government regularly initiates technology-focused, innovative programs like Smart Dubai or the most recent Dubai RE-Tech platform.

The concept of the convergence of digital and traditional approaches is built around valuable data and how it can be leveraged to resolve real-world problems that stakeholders encounter while buying, leasing, managing, or renting real estate. And a few interesting startups like PropInvest Tech and Nomad Home have already got the gist of that and focused on simplifying the lives of real estate sellers and buyers.

However, there are a lot of challenges that are related not only to investing but to renting a property in Dubai. The city attracts a lot of expatriates who need a place to live but aren’t ready or willing to buy an apartment or a villa, and their number won’t go down soon, especially as Expo 2020 draws even more attention to Dubai.

The rental market is another promising niche for tech enthusiasts, as there are a lot of bottlenecks proptech solutions may help to improve. For example, Property Finder, one of the biggest websites where tenants may find a vacant apartment to rent, eradicated the need to go through papers or apply to the agency.

But the relationships between tenant, landlord, or sometimes real estate agents are more complex and may contain more surprises and difficulties, considering the strict policies regulating the rights and obligations of the tenants and landlords. So, it may be safe to make an assumption that Dubai real estate needs tech solutions that will help organize the processes after the rental agreement is signed.

Top Trends for the Real Estate Software Development in Dubai

So, what technical solutions are at their peak right now? We overview the most popular and relevant features that property management software can provide and facilitate the lives of real estate brokers, renters, and property owners.

Targeting to Different Audiences

As we have mentioned many times within the article, there are several types of stakeholders that may benefit from a property management software. Tenants want the landlords fulfilling their obligations, fix repairs, and properly communicate, landlords want to manage their properties and payments efficiently and with minimal efforts, and property managers or brokers want to keep both of these groups happy and satisfied, so they would choose to cooperate with agencies. Real estate platform development may unite the functionality covering these needs in one system and ensure seamless communication and interaction between these people.

Virtual Home Tours

COVID-19 and lockdowns have changed our perception of real-life interactions. And really, why arrange a meeting if it could be a Zoom call? The same concept is being transferred to property overview. Thanks to VR technologies, potential tenants may visit the apartment virtually, explore it and make emotional connections. Of course, it wouldn’t replace the physical tours, as people still want to ensure that the reality matches the virtual image they were shown. But at the same time, it might speed up and simplify the selection process, as tenants will be able to discard unsuitable options very quickly.

Property Management Automation

To profit from leasing property, landlords or property managers need to provide maintenance, ensure that it doesn’t stay vacant, control the regularity of tenants’ payments, and take care of an even bigger amount of repetitive tasks. Real estate management software development may cover and streamline most of these actions. Property management software allows saving data on rental properties, tenants, owners, maintenance requests, etc., and automates some manual tasks like processing tickets, sending notifications on upcoming payments, or properties that will be vacant soon. It might sound simple, but it can save a lot of time and resources for managers and improve the services.

Smart Technologies

IoT is a cornerstone for the concepts of smart homes and smart buildings and enhanced with artificial intelligence, cloud-based solutions, and other cutting-edge technologies, it may do a significant change in the rental industry. Smart technologies powers up constant monitoring of the property and its facilities state. For example, with predictive maintenance, the landlord may prevent pipe leaks by patching them up before the leak occurs. As a result, it leads to lower costs required for maintenance and less stressful situations for everyone involved.

Real Estate Management Software Development: The Main Points You Should Know

Real estate management software development for Dubai is a good idea nowadays, as the industry keeps growing and attracts a lot of support from local government and investors. Whether you represent a real estate company that needs to improve its operations or you are a tech leader that wants to scale up its proptech startup.

Custom software development will be able to fulfill your needs in automation, enhancing efficiency, and improved data management. It will be a significant investment, but as a result, you will receive a software piece designed for your needs, that will be easy to implement and upgrade further.

For those who work on growing their startup, cooperation with software development companies may help to speed up the development and bring new points of view on functionality and usability.

Here are the most demanded types of real estate management software you may need or want to create.

Rental Property Management Software

Property management software, or PMS, is a system to help property managers take care of the assigned property on behalf of its owners. Instead of keeping all paperwork physical, manually filling spreadsheets, and scheduling maintenance calls, the manager can use software to cover these tasks and cut the time spent on such mundane things as data entry, or schedule.

A screen from the PMS admin panel developed by Altamira

The property management system is divided into several groups by the sphere of its implementation:

• residential apartment management;
• homeowners associations (HOA) and condo management;
• commercial property management;
• hotel and hostel management;
• industrial property.

The main features include:

• industry-specific accounting;
• online payments;
• maintenance tickets automation;
• tenant portal;
• property lease cycle management;
• document management and digital archive.

It’s also possible to enhance your custom PMS with more profound features, such as VR tours, and integrations with IoT sensors to monitor the state of facilities.

A powerful PMS can drastically change the way the agencies approach the management of property, and relationships with tenants and landlords. The main improvements will concern the satisfaction of tenants, the speed of how maintenance works will be done, the productive use of managers’ efforts and time, and efficient data usage.

Real Estate ERP Software

Real estate ERP systems grants you even more opportunities to automate and streamline your real estate operations. As with any other enterprise resource planning system, the real estate one helps to connect all departments within the organization, create a convenient space for collaborations, and generate deeper insights into the company’s work.

An example of a real estate ERP software wireframe developed by Altamira

Some ERP features will remind you of the functionality of PMS, as it can contain the module with the same purpose. Other possible modules are:

• leasing management;
• asset management;
• procurement management;
• reporting;
• analytics and forecasting;
• additional modules for tenants or landlords.

Real Estate CRM Software

A real estate CRM system is an integral tool for those who want to have a better insight into the client base and increase the quality of interactions with leads and potential customers. Customer relationship management software helps real estate companies to keep track of customers’ data in one place, record every interaction with them, and automate a lot of real estate operations, like invoice generation, email newsletters, etc.

The main set of features consists of the following ones:

• deal and lead management;
• property sales management;
• invoicing and billing;
• marketing automation;
• chat-bot integration;
• analytics and reporting;
• electronic document management.

Real Estate Software Development with Altamira

Altamira is a reliable software development vendor with more than 10 years of experience.

We help businesses grow and develop through the implementation of custom software that enhances efficiency, automates major processes, and brings businesses to a new level of operations.

Cooperating with us, you will benefit from:

• a team with expertise and experience in real estate software development;
• a big pool of engineers with different technologies’ knowledge (web, mobile);
• strong delivery department with established processes and tested approaches;
• flexible cooperation and pricing models;
• high level of ownership over the project we work on;
• capacities to scale the development if required;
• an account management team focused on bringing successful outcomes to the client.

A screen of the dashboard for Highrise, another real estate software we have developed

What Team Do You Need to Develop Property Management Software?

Depending on your needs, requirements, and capabilities, we can provide you with a development team that consists of:

• front-end developers;
• back-end developers;
• mobile developers;
• solutions architects;
• business analytics;
• QA engineers;
• UI/UX designers;
• DevOps specialists;
• project and delivery managers.

On average, the development of property management software, real estate ERP or CRM may take at least 6 months with a monthly check of around 40-50k USD.

Whether you are a startup looking for a vendor to scale up the development or a real estate business aiming to implement new property management software, our team will carefully assess your business needs, and goals and come up with the optimal, custom solution.

In Conclusion on Real Estate Software Dubai

Real estate software in Dubai is a hot topic right now. Whether you are a part of a real estate agency, create a proptech startup, or own a property, appropriate property management software may help you improve your experience within the market.

We believe that Dubai real estate needs more powerful and industry-focused tech initiatives to facilitate its growth and reach a new level in property leasing.

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