04 · Next steps
Dubai Square has not opened a public leasing campaign. Here is how to approach the landlord anyway, and what to have ready before you do.
Read this before anything else. This site is an independent briefing and cannot lease you space. No public leasing enquiry line, unit schedule or rent card has been published for Dubai Square. Any party offering to secure you a unit for a fee is not acting for the landlord. All commercial discussions should go through Emaar Properties or Dubai Holding directly, or through a RERA-registered commercial agent instructed by you.
Route in
Approach Emaar’s retail leasing function through Emaar Properties’ corporate channels. Emaar has been the sole owner of Dubai Creek Harbour since 2022, so — unlike the 2018 joint-venture era — there is one door, not two.
A RERA-registered retail agency with an existing relationship on the Emaar portfolio will know when the leasing campaign opens and how units are being blocked. For a first-time market entrant this is usually the shortest route.
Many international brands enter the GCC through a local franchise or joint-venture partner who already holds space across the major landlords. It costs margin, but it converts a cold approach into an existing tenant conversation.
Preparation
Landlords of this scale filter hard at the first meeting. A brand that arrives with the pack below is treated as a live prospect; one that arrives with a logo and an ambition is not.
The information asymmetry runs heavily in the landlord’s favour on a pre-opening scheme. These are the questions that close some of that gap.
Indicative planning horizon
A generic sequence for an international brand entering a new-build super-regional centre. Use it to sanity-check your own runway — it is not a published Dubai Square schedule.
Market study, partner or direct-entry decision, first landlord contact, expression of interest lodged.
Unit identification, negotiation of rent and incentives, board approval, heads of terms signed.
Lease execution, trade licence and UAE entity in place, concept design submitted for landlord approval.
Contractor appointed, long-lead items ordered, opening stock buy committed, recruitment begins.
Site handover, fit-out, systems integration and testing, staff training, soft opening.
Register interest
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Common questions
Not confirmed. Emaar stated in December 2025 that construction was underway with a build programme of about three years, which points to 2028; some published coverage indicates early 2029. The developer has not announced a trading date, and on a scheme of this scale the date should be treated as movable until a handover date appears in a lease.
Emaar Properties. Dubai Square was launched in 2018 as an Emaar and Dubai Holding joint venture, but Emaar acquired Dubai Holding’s stake in Dubai Creek Harbour in 2022 in a transaction valued at AED 7.5 billion, and the December 2025 relaunch names Emaar alone. Coverage still describing a live JV is out of date.
Unit schedules have not been published, and neither has a gross leasable area. The 750,000 m² figure often quoted is gross retail floor space from the 2018 plan, which includes circulation, back-of-house and plant — the lettable total will be materially lower. On any reading the scheme is large enough for everything from kiosks to department-store anchors, but the demise mix is a first-meeting question.
Unpublished. For context, prime Dubai retail rents rose around 9% year on year, and super-regional malls are trading at near-full occupancy — a landlord’s market. Expect any pre-opening incentive to be structured as a fit-out contribution or a stepped rent rather than a lower headline figure.
No public leasing campaign has been announced. That does not mean conversations are not happening — anchor and major-line negotiations on a scheme like this typically run years before any public campaign. If Dubai Square is strategically important to you, register interest now rather than waiting for a launch.
Not necessarily. Foreign companies can hold UAE trade licences directly, and many international retailers operate their own subsidiaries in Dubai. A franchise or joint-venture partner is a commercial choice about speed, local knowledge and landlord relationships rather than a legal requirement. Take UAE legal advice on structure before you commit either way.
Primarily by road, via Ras Al Khor Road (E44), plus the district’s own resident and hotel population arriving on foot. The Dubai Metro Blue Line serving Dubai Creek Harbour is scheduled to begin operations on 9 September 2029, which may be after the centre opens — so the opening years should be modelled without it.
Because a large share of what circulates about Dubai Square — the 750,000 m² figure, the Chinatown district, the waterpark, the smart-retail technology — comes from the July 2018 launch and was not repeated in Emaar’s December 2025 statement. It may all still be the plan. But a brand committing several million dirhams of fit-out should know which numbers the developer stood behind last year and which it has not mentioned in eight years.
No. This is an independent research briefing with no affiliation to Emaar Properties, Dubai Holding or their subsidiaries, and it cannot lease space or pass on enquiries. Every figure on it is sourced from public announcements and published market data, and should be verified with the developer before you act on it.