A question to those who have experienced life in UAE and Qatar etc. What’s better in terms of accommodation? Villa (say a 5 bed) or compound?
Re: Compound or villa?
It’s compound villa or apartment …
Here is a compound villa
Qatar Real Estate | Renting Properties | Doha - Western style compound villa
And here is an apartment
QATAR REAL ESTATE | Doha Apartments | Qatar Rental | The Pearl Qatar
Re: Compound or villa?
Compound Villa
Further from town
Big rooms - spacious
Communal areas, swimming pool and generous parking facilities
Apartment
Nearer town
Skyline
Private
Cheaper unless penthouse
Re: Compound or villa?
With kids I would take the compound Villa!:k:
Re: Compound or villa?
You should has asked Psyah. He has done the research already :D
Re: Compound or villa?
You should has asked Psyah. He has done the research already :D
He doesn't like talking to me in real life unless it's a very Islamic topic.
With kids I would do compound villa. But choose a compound that has as many facilities as possible. Both indoor and outdoor so your kids can play inside in the hot summer months.
Re: Compound or villa?
He doesn't like talking to me in real life unless it's a very Islamic topic.
then add "al" and "wal" in each of your sentence to make it look islamic (ok arabic) like
al-psyah, wal-compund kia khayaal?
al-payah, wal-apartment dont like.
and on serious note, with kids I'd go for Compound. I do not have personal experience but couple of my close friends (1 in KSA and 1 in UAE) has told me that they used to be in Apartment before their kids grew up (7-10 years old kids) and then they moved to compound.
Re: Compound or villa?
Thanks all. It was very helpful. I still have no idea about the difference between the two. 
I guess an apartment is smaller with no outdoor area and swimming pool?
“Compound” sounds to me a very small prison like place.
Re: Compound or villa?
My cousin is in UAE and she has a huge villa. It's massive!!! 10 something bedrooms ... more than half of which are locked and unused. And it's so far from the city. She keeps complaining how boring it is.
If it were me, I'd get an apartment in the city. You'd be close to restaurants and malls and all those happening places.
Re: Compound or villa?
I guess it depends on what kind of life you want for your family.....
if you are the type that need night-life, entertainment in terms of theatres, cinema, shopping etc then you should go for the apartment closer to the city.
if you prefer to have your space, some green area where kids can play outside and a little bit of isolation then go for the villa.
your preference in lifestyle should determine the type of housing........
Re: Compound or villa?
Compound villa, lots of recreational activities and meets-up.. gym/pool/rec area/game zone.. buses and shuttles to malls.
Re: Compound or villa?
Just make sure you have access to some sort of transport wherever it is you choose, so you don't feel like you can't get out when you need to.
Re: Compound or villa?
Stand alone villas are best. Are u moving?
Re: Compound or villa?
Just make sure you have access to some sort of transport wherever it is you choose, so you don't feel like you can't get out when you need to.
oh yeah that's another thing I have to consider. Is it safe for a woman to travel alone by taxi in UAE and Qatar?
Re: Compound or villa?
Stand alone villas are best. Are u moving?
might be.
Re: Compound or villa?
Had no idea that you guys are considering a move to the Middle East. :k:
We have lived in Dubai for 4 years, 2 years in a compound villa (Arabian Ranches) and 2 years in an apartment (Discovery Gardens).
What I liked about living in the Ranches:
[ul]
[li]Spacious garden[/li][LIST]
[li]Loved drinking tea there in the afternoon.[/li][li]Was great for my son too who loved playing there. We also had a playground just across the street.[/li][li]In summer you can hardly use it though due to the heat. And you spend a lot of summer on maintaining it (especially in summer).[/li][/ul]
[li]Quietness[/li][ul]
[li]Due to the fact that the whole area consists of villas and there are no apartment buildings there it is relatively quiet.[/li][/ul]
[li]Facilities[/li][ul]
[li]We had a Swimming pool, a tennis court, a basketball field within our compound which was reserved for residents only[/li][/ul]
[li]Medical Center[/li][ul]
[li]The Arabian Ranches have their own Medical Center (owned by a British Pakistani) and all the docs there were great![/li][li]This is very useful as hospitals and clinics in the “outside world” are usually quite crowded, so it’s good to have your “own” Clinic within your relatively remote area. 90% of the patients there are residents and therefore it’s not that crowded.[/li][/ul]
[/LIST]
What I disliked about living in the Ranches:
[ul]
[li]Snobbish community[/li][LIST]
[li]I don’t know if it’s still the case, but many of our neighbours there were quite snobbish. Luckily we also found a few nice ones who we’d get along with. :)[/li][/ul]
[li]Remoteness[/li][ul]
[li]It’s a community smack in the middle of the desert. In the meantime they have built more places around it, but back then I used to see empty desert left and right of the highway on my commute to office. It took me around 25 to 30 minutes to get to work at Dubai Internet City (on average).[/li][/ul]
[li]Bad mobile signals[/li][ul]
[li]This may sound strange, but it is quite annoying when you have to go outside the house to make a phone call, because the area is not properly covered by mobile signals due to its remoteness. However I’ve heard that this problem has been solved in the meantime, but you may want to keep that in mind in case you move to a remote and relatively new area elsewhere.[/li][/ul]
[li]Distance to Masjid[/li][ul]
[li]At first there was no Masjid at all in the Ranches so we had to drive all the way to Barsha (15 minutes). Now they have one but it’s still not walking distance for most of the residents.[/li][/ul]
[li]Electricity and water bills[/li][ul]
[li]Twice as high compared to living in an apartment[/li][/ul]
[/LIST]
What I liked about living in the Discovery Gardens:
[ul]
[li]Great community[/li][LIST]
[li]A lot of families with similar backgrounds (moved from Europe/US, have a couple of small kids, etc.). We really made a lot of friends there. Playground was around the corner.[/li][/ul]
[li]Closeness to Ibn Battuta Mall[/li][ul]
[li]It was a 5 minute drive to Ibn Battuta which is one of the largest malls in Dubai and so we didn’t really HAVE to go anywhere else for shopping/dining, etc. unless we wanted to.[/li][/ul]
[li]Masjid in walking distance[/li][li]Closeness to Sheikh Zayed Road and the Dubai Metro[/li][ul]
[li]This gives you excellent access to wherever you want to go in Dubai, regardless of whether you go by car or Metro. My communte to work was not more than 10 minutes.[/li][/ul]
[li]Excellent Maintenance services[/li][ul]
[li]Compared to the Ranches the Maintenance guys operating in Discovery Gardens were a lot easier to deal with. You’d get an appointment much sooner, the work would be done faster and in most cases they would do it properly and you wouldn’t have to call them again for the same problem. In the Ranches it was not that smooth.[/li][/ul]
[/LIST]
What I disliked about living in the Discovery Gardens:
[ul]
[li]Limited space[/li][LIST]
[li]Even though the apartment was huge compared to the one we had back in Europe, it was still much smaller than the villa of course.[/li][/ul]
[li]Lack of facilities[/li][ul]
[li]We were told that a Swimming pool was under construction one block away. It remained under construction the entire time we lived there. Was never finished.[/li][/ul]
[li]Lack of greenery[/li][ul]
[li]We had no private garden in the Discovery Gardens (sounds funny). And in general the place was not as Green as the Ranches where they had planted a lot of trees and maintain a lot of small green parks across the whole community.[/li][/ul]
[/LIST]
I guess this doesn’t make your decision any easier but it might give you the chance to prioritize on things.
Re: Compound or villa?
Though i prefer villa over an apartment, but it all depends on so many other things.
its very hot most of the year in the UAE, and Qatar too. you will be making very little use of outdoor facilities in your Villa anyway. Do check average traffic conditions between both of these places and your work place (if its already known). I dont know about Qatar, but it really does matter in the UAE. also do some research on what nationalities live mostly in those areas, how far is Masjid, as Umer mentioned above, despite being a muslim country still in some areas which are populated mostly by westerners, Masajid are usually not enough.
Re: Compound or villa?
I dont know about Qatar, but it really does matter in the UAE.
The traffic in Qatar is worse. I've been there a couple of times.
Re: Compound or villa?
^ pity : (