Not a developer? No land for you.
Looking to put up a building in a new city? You’ll need to be a real estate developer to get the land. New city authorities are no longer permitted to sell land earmarked for construction to individuals after the Housing Ministry issued a decree limiting sales to real estate developers, Al Mal reports. The decree also allows the land to be used for government projects, the newspaper says, without providing further details.
Is this part of the new construction regulations we’ve been waiting on? It’s not entirely clear, but it appears to be part of the government’s wider effort to crack down on wildcat and disorganized construction in the country. The government had ordered a ban last May on construction permits in urban centers as it works on new regulations that are expected to govern everything from building height, ratios, and usage to urban coordination and red tape. Last we heard, the Local Development Ministry began trialing the new regulations at the beginning of this month.