DUBAI’S NATURE FIRST BET

The Acres sits in the heart of Dubailand — a 1,600-square-kilometre master-planned district stretched between Sheikh Zayed Road and Emirates Road, designed two decades ago as Dubai’s villa belt. On paper, that makes it suburban. In practice, it’s something more specific: the first Meraas community built around water and landscape rather than around skyline views or beachfront, and the first villa product the developer has released at this scale.

Launched in November 2023 by Meraas — a Dubai Holding subsidiary best known for City Walk, Bluewaters Island, and La Mer — The Acres was conceived as a counterweight to the high-density vertical districts that defined the previous Meraas portfolio. The brief was different here: swimmable lagoons, themed gardens, 1,199 standalone villas, and a community footprint that prioritises green space and pedestrian flow over rentable square footage. Adjacent to the Plantation Equestrian and Polo Club and within reach of Global Village, Hamdan Sports Complex, and Arabian Ranches, the location reads as suburban-prestige rather than urban-prime.

The single most important fact about The Acres is that **every released phase has sold out at launch**, often within hours. Phase 1 (November 2023), Phase 2 (February 2024), and the Estates collections released in Q3 2024 cleared at the developer level. Nothing remains from Meraas. Everything trading today is **resale only**, and that changes the entire mathematical model around this community — pricing, payment plans, entry strategy.

THE PHASES: THE ACRES IS NOT ONE PRODUCT

One of the most common mistakes buyers make is treating The Acres as a single development. It isn’t. The community is structured into distinct release phases and collections, each with its own pricing logic, layout typology, and buyer profile.

Phase 1 (The Acres) — released November 2023. The original launch, 642 villas spanning 3, 4, and 5 bedrooms. Starting prices at launch ranged from AED 5.09M for 3-bedroom villas to roughly AED 10M+ for 5-bedroom configurations. This is the entry-level phase by Acres standards, with the broadest unit count and the most secondary-market activity. Buyer profile at launch: family end-users and yield investors betting on Dubailand’s long-term repositioning 

Phase 2 (The Acres Phase 2) — released February 2024. Same villa typology as Phase 1 — 3 to 5 bedrooms, 3,049–6,001 sqft — but launched at higher base prices reflecting the strong absorption of Phase 1. Buyers who missed the first release paid a premium for the same product. This phase forms the bulk of current resale inventory.

Phase 3 (The Acres Estates Phase 3) — released Q3 2024. The pricing logic shifts here. Meraas dropped the 3-bedroom option entirely and pivoted upward: 4, 5, and 6-bedroom villas, with the 5-bedroom starting around AED 11M and the 6-bedroom from AED 15.48M. This is positioned as the final villa phase before the estates layer kicks in. Buyer profile: end-users upgrading, family offices, regional buyers from KSA and Kuwait.

The Acres Estates — Ivory Collection and Amber Collection** — released alongside Phase 3 and forming the masterplan’s apex tier. These are mansions, not villas: 5, 6, and 7-bedroom standalone homes arranged around the central lagoon system, with plot sizes reaching 14,516 sqft and built-up areas from 6,913 to 11,089 sqft. The Ivory Collection emphasises classical architectural language; the Amber Collection takes a contemporary direction with glass facades and smart-home integration. Starting prices: 5-bedroom mansion from AED 13.28M, 6-bedroom from AED 15.48M, 7-bedroom from AED 20M.

Each of these phases trades as a separate sub-market. Phase 1 villas resell at one rate, Phase 3 villas at another, and Estates mansions occupy a different price stratum entirely. Average Acres prices tell you nothing useful — you have to know which phase and which collection.

THE PRODUCT: WHAT YOU ACTUALLY GET

The Acres villas across all phases share a consistent design vocabulary — but the underlying typologies differ meaningfully and behave differently in resale.

3-bedroom villas (Phase 1 & 2 only) — 283 sqm / 3,047 sqft, two-storey layout, four villa types (B-3BR and B-3BR-M). Ground-floor open kitchen, living, and dining flowing onto private pool and garden. Upper level holds three bedrooms with master walk-in closet. Maid’s room and powder room on ground. Garage for two cars. Discontinued in Phase 3 — meaning the 3-bedroom inventory at The Acres is fixed and will only become rarer over time. This scarcity is starting to show in resale velocity.

4-bedroom villas — two main configurations:

• Type A-4S at 370 sqm / 3,986 sqft, three-storey including a top-floor bedroom-plus-terrace setup
• Type D-4BR at 379 sqm / 4,087 sqft, two-storey with family living area on the upper floor

The 4-bedroom is The Acres’ bread-and-butter unit. It’s also the most active resale segment.

5-bedroom villas — four typologies across Phase 1-3:

• Type C-5S at 461 sqm / 4,962 sqft (three-storey)
• Type E-5BR at 552 sqm / 5,944 sqft (corner plot, three-storey)
• Type F-5BR at 557 sqm / 6,001 sqft (three-storey, show kitchen plus service kitchen)

6 and 7-bedroom mansions (Estates only) — 642-1,030 sqm / 6,913-11,089 sqft, with the largest typology featuring a water-feature entrance and approaching 1,030 sqm (about 11,090 sqft).

All villas include private pool, private garden, and direct access to the community’s circulation paths and lagoon network.

THE PRICING REALITY: RESALE IS THE ONLY GAME

The Acres is structurally a resale-only market. Meraas has sold out every phase and the Estates collections. New supply will arrive only at handover (Q4 2027 for the first phases, with the final mansions delivering as late as August 2028 per the most recent Meraas timeline). Until then, anyone entering The Acres is buying from a current investor or end-user holder.

Current resale dynamics (as of May 2026):

• 3-bedroom villas — resale entry from approximately AED 6M+ depending on phase and orientation. With no further 3-bedroom releases coming, this segment is benefiting from forced scarcity
• 4-bedroom villas — the most active resale tier. Entry around AED 6.8M for the 3,915-sqft typology, with built-up rate working out to roughly AED 1,480 per sqft. This is the benchmark I quote to most off-market enquiries.
• 5-bedroom villas — resale spread is wider, depending on whether you’re looking at the smaller 4,962-sqft Type C or the 6,001-sqft Type F. Entry from around AED 9M+.
• Estates mansions (5-7 BR) — limited resale activity. Holders are mostly sitting tight, and the few units that surface ask significant premiums over launch pricing.

What’s distinct about The Acres resale market is the **payment plan inheritance**. The original 65/35 plan — 10% on booking, 55% during construction (paid by the original buyer in instalments), 35% on handover — passes to the secondary buyer. You inherit the SPA schedule. There’s no re-papering on a new payment plan. This matters: it means a resale buyer often steps into a position where the original investor has already paid 30-50% of the SPA, and the new buyer covers the premium plus the remaining payments. This structures the deal in ways that don’t apply to traditional off-plan transactions.

THE ROAD: WHY THE INFRASTRUCTURE STORY MATTERS

Connectivity is the single most contested point about The Acres. Critics argue Dubailand is too far. Supporters argue the infrastructure is catching up. Both are partially right.

Currently, the community sits along Sheikh Zayed Bin Hamdan Al Nahyan Street (D54) and connects to Emirates Road (E611) on its eastern side. Drive times depend heavily on traffic and entry point: 25 minutes to Downtown in off-peak, 40+ in rush hour. Dubai Marina sits at 30-35 minutes. DXB Airport reaches in 30 minutes via Emirates Road.

The more interesting layer is what’s being built. Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority has prioritised Sheikh Zayed Bin Hamdan Al Nahyan Street and the surrounding Dubailand corridor as a strategic upgrade zone, with expansion projects that will materially improve southbound and eastbound access from Downtown and Sheikh Zayed Road. Combined with the broader Dubai 2040 Urban Master Plan that designates Dubailand as one of the city’s five urban centres, this means the connectivity story for The Acres in 2028 will not be the connectivity story in 2024. Drive times are expected to compress meaningfully by handover.

The community is also surrounded by completed neighbourhoods rather than empty desert — Arabian Ranches, Damac Hills, Mudon, and the Polo Club to the immediate west, Global Village and IMG Worlds to the east. Schools (GEMS Metropole, Jumeirah English Speaking School, Repton School Dubai, GEMS FirstPoint, Fairgreen International) already operate within a 10-20 minute radius. The community itself includes an on-site kindergarten and primary school as part of the masterplan. This is not a frontier development. It’s the next tier inward from one that already exists.

WHO ACTUALLY BUYS HERE

The Acres buyer profile splits cleanly along the phase/collection axis.

Phase 1 and Phase 2 (3-5 BR villas) — primarily growing families relocating from apartments in Downtown, Marina, and JVC who want garden space and a private pool without the price of Emirates Hills or Tilal Al Ghaf. A smaller but persistent investor cohort is buying for handover-stage flip plays, betting on completion-phase appreciation. Foreign buyers from KSA, Kuwait, and Egypt are well represented.

Phase 3 — upgraders. People who already own one or two properties in Dubai and are stepping up to a larger family villa. Lower investor concentration than earlier phases.

Estates (Ivory and Amber, 5-7 BR mansions) — high-net-worth buyers, mostly end-users, often regional. Family offices, ultra-affluent expats settling long-term, occasionally fund vehicles. Investor turnover here is minimal — these are bought to keep.

What you won’t find much of at The Acres is short-term rental investors. The community structure, distance from tourist zones, and family-oriented amenity programming make it unsuitable for holiday-home plays. This is end-user territory.

THE OFFICIAL FUTURE

Dubailand is one of the five urban centres designated in the Dubai 2040 Urban Master Plan, alongside Downtown, Deira, Expo 2020 Centre, and Silicon Park. That designation means government capital is committed to the area for the next two decades — infrastructure, transport, public spaces, regulatory priority.

For The Acres specifically, the timing aligns favourably. Handover phases run Q4 2027 through August 2028. The road network upgrades, school capacity expansion, and surrounding community completions are scheduled across roughly the same window. Buyers entering today are essentially pricing 2024-25 conditions for a 2027-28 delivery, with the assumption that the infrastructure story improves through that period.

That doesn’t mean every villa here is a good investment. It means the macro risk is unusually contained. The micro risk — which phase, which typology, which orientation, which seller — is where the actual decisions get made.

THE ADVANTAGES

• Sold-out status. Every Meraas release has cleared at launch. This validates the price discovery and constrains future supply.

• Meraas as developer. Track record of delivering completed, well-maintained communities. Not a speculative entry-level developer.

• Inheritance-based payment plan. Resale buyers inherit the 65/35 SPA structure. Lower total cash burden than fresh off-plan.

• Discontinued 3-bedroom inventory. The 3-BR product line was retired in Phase 3, creating built-in scarcity for that typology.

• Lagoon-centred masterplan. Real swimmable lagoons (not decorative) integrated into the community design, plus seven themed gardens.

• Strong school catchment. Repton School Dubai, Jumeirah English Speaking School, GEMS FirstPoint, GEMS Metropole, and Fairgreen International all within a 10-20 minute drive. The community itself includes on-site kindergarten and primary school.

• Dubai 2040 designation. Dubailand is a protected urban centre in the long-term master plan.

• Resort-style amenities. Clubhouse, retail promenade, jogging tracks, floating decks, adventure park, wellness gardens.

• Premium adjacencies. Plantation Equestrian and Polo Club, Arabian Ranches, Damac Hills, Global Village all within minutes.

THE DRAWBACKS

Current drive times to the city core. Today, Downtown sits at around 25-30 minutes off-peak from The Acres, and 35-45 in rush hour. That’s longer than buyers used to Marina or Business Bay are accustomed to. The important context: Dubai’s RTA has Sheikh Zayed Bin Hamdan Al Nahyan Street and the wider Dubailand corridor flagged for upgrade, and the surrounding road network is being expanded ahead of the community’s 2027-2028 handover window. By the time owners move in, the connectivity picture should look meaningfully different from today’s drive maps. Buyers entering now are essentially pricing 2024 traffic for a 2028 community.

Why This Matters for Off-Market Sourcing

The Acres produces a steady flow of motivated resales precisely because of how it was sold. Phases cleared in hours, which means a non-trivial portion of original buyers were speculative — they grabbed inventory at launch without a long-term hold intention. As handover approaches and the 35% final payment looms, some of those original buyers need to exit. Others bought multiple units and are rebalancing. Others have liquidity events elsewhere that force a sale.

None of these sellers list on Bayut at the asking prices that retail brokers post. The real off-market activity here is quiet — moving between agents who know the original buyer pool, who have direct line to motivated sellers, and who can transact before a listing ever surfaces publicly.

This is the layer of The Acres market that doesn’t show up on the classifieds. It’s the layer I work in.