Dubai Rental Yield & ROI Calculator

Rental yield is a property's annual rental income as a percentage of its purchase price. Gross yield uses the full scheduled rent; net yield uses the income left after vacancy and the landlord's operating costs. It measures recurring rental return only, not any change in the property's value.

Divide the annual rent by the purchase price and multiply by 100. A AED 110,000 rent on a AED 1,500,000 property is a gross yield of 7.33%.

Start with the rent you expect to collect after vacancy, subtract annual operating costs (service charges, management, maintenance, insurance and other recurring costs) to get net operating income (NOI), then divide NOI by the purchase price. In our worked example NOI is AED 79,275, a net yield of 5.29% against a gross yield of 7.33%.

The recurring costs of owning and letting the property: service charges, property management fees, maintenance and repairs, landlord's insurance and any other regular landlord costs. Mortgage payments are not operating costs; they are shown separately as cash flow after financing. One-off purchase costs are not annual costs either, but you can include them in the acquisition cost.

Yes. Under Law No. 6 of 2019 the owner of a unit in a jointly owned building pays its service charges and remains liable for them even if a tenant was meant to pay. They are usually one of the largest costs for an apartment, so a yield without them overstates the return.

Every month the property stands empty is rent you do not collect. On a AED 120,000 rent, a 5% vacancy allowance reduces collected rent to AED 114,000, and on a AED 1,600,000 price the yield falls from 7.50% to 7.13%. Gross yield ignores vacancy, which is why the calculator also shows effective yield.

If you pay a manager, yes. The calculator applies the fee to the rent actually collected, not the scheduled rent, because managers are normally paid on what they collect. Use the rate you have been quoted; there is no regulated Dubai management fee, and if you manage the property yourself, leave it blank.

Annual cash flow after mortgage payments divided by the cash you put in (the price minus the mortgage, plus acquisition costs you entered). Financing our example with a AED 900,000 mortgage at 4.5% gives AED 19,245.12 of annual cash flow on AED 700,000 invested: 2.75%. It does not count capital growth, mortgage principal repaid, resale value or selling costs.

Not automatically. A mortgage reduces the cash you invest, but adds repayments. If the net yield is higher than the cost of the loan, cash-on-cash return can rise; if repayments exceed NOI, cash flow turns negative. Enter your own loan terms to see the effect.

Net yield is the more realistic measure of what a property returns, because it reflects vacancy and running costs. Gross yield is useful for quick comparisons between listings, but two properties with the same gross yield can have very different net yields once service charges are included.

No. It shows current, annualised rental economics only. It does not forecast property prices, resale profit, rent growth or selling costs.

Your service charge statement shows what you actually pay. The Dubai Land Department's Service Charge Index lets you look up the RERA-approved service charges for a jointly owned project by project name, usage and year.

Use the Dubai Property Buying Cost Calculator to estimate DLD, trustee, mortgage registration and other purchase costs, then enter the total here as acquisition costs.