Dubai is a city of dreams usually when you see videos or hear about Dubai.
It’s all the glamor stories or weekend pictures but the city has a day-to-day normal life as well and I intend to talk about it.
The city can be overwhelming for a newcomer and I see people spend way too much money on useless things.
Truth is, if you pace yourself properly you can live a pretty good life on a budget in Dubai.
a budget in Dubai.
I’ve started this Living in Dubai mini-series to address the frequent queries in my inbox.
I’ll be sharing more on each and every topic around Dubai, if you want me to cover anything, comment down below.
Residence:
Firstly I want to talk about living in Dubai. People who work here in Dubai try to live as efficiently as possible. Usually places near Metro Dubai cost a lot more as they provide ease of travel and as you move away from the metro, the rent starts to decrease.
Most of the people rent in Dubai as property buying is on peak these days and people usually buy-to-rent in Dubai as it provides a great passive income.
The legal way to rent is actually pretty tiresome as you first have to rent an apartment on either 1 cheque for a year meaning you pay whole years’ rent in advance and then you have to do your own DEWA (Dubai Electric and water authority) connection and pay a deposit there and then comes the furnishing part and that’s pretty tiresome so there’s another practice that people do:
Accepted practice here is renting either a room or part of a room along with furniture and paying a monthly lump sum amount to the landlord, it is hassle-free and you can leave any month and anytime, that’s part of the reason why people in Dubai are very agile and move around a lot. The rent scenario is as follows:
You can rent bed space which means you will get a part of a room where there will be a bed and some locker space and a shared bathroom.
Second, you can rent a partition, it will be bigger than the bed space portion of the room will be partitioned and it typically has its own fridge, your own wardrobe, and your own bed and your kitchen and bathroom will be shared.
Third, you can rent a room that will be an entire room, it will have basic necessary room essentials and you can get a dedicated bathroom or shared one depending on your budget.
Fourth, you can rent an entire apartment with furniture and pay a lump sum amount to the landlord including utilities and internet.
My advice:
If you’re coming to Dubai, you should at least have 3 months’ rent in advance with you also for a place of stay, if you are on a budget, get a place away from the main city and get a bus to the metro but if you have to commute every day then try for a license as it will allow you to move further away from the city while keeping your living standard up.
If money is not an issue then the sky’s the limit, rents in 2023 start from AED 35,000 a year to AED 350,000 a year for a single-bed apartment in Dubai.
Food:
Dubai is multicultural in its true sense, any food that you can think of, you can order. If you can think it, they can make it. There are restaurants that charge AED 1,000 for a single lunch and there are restaurants that charge AED 50 for the similar. It all depends on where you eat from, I have found the quality of food at both types is pretty good.
If you go to restaurants inside Burj al Arab you will likely to charge upwards of AED 500 for a single lunch.
Whereas restaurants at malls or food delivery apps would charge you around AED 100 for the same food and
If you go to roadside cafes and desi restaurants, you can get lunch/breakfast for as low as AED 50.
My Advice:
Try to find the restaurants that serve food that you like and are on your way to work/home, for weekdays, go with the lowest cost ones, and every once in a while do the fancy restaurant experience.
Summary:
That’s all for this blog post, I’ll be sharing more on each and every topic around Dubai, if you want me to cover anything, comment down below.