The overall activity in the real estate market was dull in the first 11 months of 2018, compared to the same period last year.

The total value of property transactions in the Sultanate till the end of November 2018 declined by 3% to reach OMR2.40 billion from OMR2.48 billion for the same period of 2017, as indicated by the preliminary statistics issued by National Center for Statistics and information (NCSI).

Sultanate's government collected OMR77.3 million as real estate transaction fees during January-November period this year, 5.6% higher compared to the same period of last year.  Of the total traded value till the end of November 2018, OMR875.5 million worth transactions were sales contracts, while OMR1.51 billion transactions were mortgage deals. As many as 53,884 sales contracts were executed in the 11-month period of 2018 against 55,537 contracts during the same period of 2017. However, the total number of mortgage contracts fell by 16.2% to reach 14,841 against 17,714 contracts in 2017. NCSI data reveal a significant fall in traded value of exchange (barter) contracts by 26.5% during the January-November 2018 period to OMR14.7 million, as against OMR20 million posted last year over the comparable period. The number of barter contracts witnessed a rise of 43.1% to 1,381, compared to 965 contracts in 2017.

As for plots issued till the end of November 2018, the number stood at 204,193, which is a decline of 2.4% from the end of November 2017, when 209,195 plots were issued.  The number of plots allocated to GCC citizens surged by 18.5% to reach 1,330 plots compared to 1,122 plots during the same period last year, the data showed.