Three years on, it is clear that Qatar has by and large avoided what plagued many of its World Cup host predecessors – the big White Elephant.
In spite of a rush of building projects to open a slew of new hotels and apartments for the November-December 2022 event, the gas-rich nation was shrewd enough to ensure that there was a wealth of temporary accommodation for fans, including cruise ships and campsites, to offset the risk of massive oversupply later.
Anum Hassan, head of research at international consulting group ValuStrat, says Qatar was keen to avoid mistakes made by previous hosts such as South Africa, Russia and Brazil.
“The initial plan for the 2022 World Cup was to have 60,000 hospitality keys, but this would have nearly tripled the supply, which was impractical and not justified by future demand,” he tells AGBI.
In 2022 there were around 38,000 hotel keys, with an average occupancy rate of 60 percent, Hassan said.
To address the temporary demand for Fifa 2022, the Qatari government leased residential units at specific standards.
In addition, around 64,000 rooms were made available on cruise ships, with residents also able to rent out their homes on platforms such as AirBnB or VRBO after Qatar Tourism launched a “holiday home” scheme allowing people in Doha to apply for licences to offer sub-lets.
Many football fans chose not to stay in Qatar at all, or only for a night or two, and fly over for the day from Dubai.
Flydubai alone transported more than 130,000 fans over the tournament’s duration, with close to 1,300 flights. Hotels in Dubai raised prices by as much as 75 percent as demand surged.
Yet Qatar did not escape all the fallout from hosting such a big event. Adrian Camps, chairman of the board of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors in Qatar, said there has been a “slight” oversupply of hotels but Qatar is building its tourism and events offerings to offset the impact.
“Tourism has increased quite a lot since the World Cup so they’re coping,” he says.
Following the World Cup, apartment rents decreased by as much as 10 percent. Villa rents remained largely unchanged.
“Everyone was rushing to finish construction up to Fifa, so there are [now] no really big construction projects creating activity here and quite a lot of people have moved on in the construction industry,” Camps says.
However, older residential developments in secondary locations have faced tougher competition from more affordable, high-quality and newly released residential projects.
“People are using the opportunity to move upmarket,” Camps says. “Good quality locations in well-managed towers have good occupancy. Older, poorly managed stuff has low occupancy now.”
As Qatar moves to attract more international investment, including in real estate, attractive 100 percent foreign-ownership plans are underway. The government is considering more investor-friendly regulations, similar to those of Dubai and Abu Dhabi, which could give the property market a boost.
Meanwhile, short-term accommodation commandeered or developed by the government for the Qatar World Cup has eventually re-entered the market in phases. As a result of gradually rising demand, nearly all the accommodation has achieved reasonably high occupancy rates in the medium term, Hassan says.
Even during the traditionally slower summer months, annual occupancy rates have remained above 66 percent, reflecting Qatar’s strategic push to position itself as a year-round destination, according to a 2024 ValuStrat report.
For a detailed perspective on the property market, visit: Qatar - Review 2024 - Outlook 2025
