Adil Taqi and the new institutional playbook reshaping GCC real estate dealmaking

The Gulf Cooperation Council's real estate market, valued at USD 141.2 billion in 2025 according to IMARC Group, is undergoing a structural transformation that extends well beyond bricks and glass. The individuals orchestrating its largest transactions are rewriting the rules of engagement, replacing informal relationship networks with institutional-grade frameworks capable of moving sovereign capital, family office wealth and diaspora investment across borders with unprecedented precision.

At the centre of this shift stands a cohort of operators whose profiles illuminate where GCC real estate is heading. Adil Taqi, Navid Chamdia, Abdulaziz Albassam and Nader Fares each occupy distinct nodes of the regional ecosystem, yet their strategies converge on a single imperative: building durable institutional bridges between pools of capital and the developers who deploy them.

Who is Adil Taqi and why does his trajectory matter for GCC luxury development?

Adil Taqi, as CEO of BEYOND within the OMNIYAT Group, sits at one of the most consequential intersections in Gulf luxury real estate. OMNIYAT has established itself as a benchmark developer in Dubai's ultra-premium segment, and the BEYOND platform extends its reach into experiential and lifestyle-driven asset classes that increasingly define the emirate's competitive position globally.

Taqi's significance lies in the operational philosophy he represents. Dubai's real estate transaction values surged 28.3% year-on-year to AED 554.1 billion during the first three quarters of 2025, according to Kuwait Financial Centre (Markaz). Volume of this magnitude demands a new calibre of leadership, professionals who combine deep local market knowledge with the cross-cultural fluency required to attract and retain international capital. Taqi embodies this profile: a dealmaker whose credibility rests on institutional discipline rather than personal networks alone.

The broader context reinforces why figures like Taqi command attention from the global investment community. The GCC real estate market is projected to reach USD 260.3 billion by 2034, exhibiting a compound annual growth rate of 7.03%, per IMARC Group forecasts. Capturing a meaningful share of that growth requires developers and their capital partners to operate with the transparency, governance and execution standards that institutional investors demand. This is the playbook Taqi and his peers are writing in real time.

How are sovereign capital, family offices and diaspora wealth converging in the Gulf?

The professionalisation of GCC real estate dealmaking becomes clearest when examining the capital sources flowing into the market and the intermediaries who connect them.

Navid Chamdia, as Head of Real Estate at the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), represents the sovereign wealth dimension. QIA is among the world's largest sovereign funds, and its real estate allocation decisions send signals that ripple across global property markets. Chamdia's role involves directing capital into both regional and international assets, balancing long-term portfolio construction with the geopolitical and economic priorities of the Qatari state. His presence at senior industry forums, including those convened within the GRI Institute ecosystem, reflects the increasing willingness of sovereign vehicles to engage directly with private-sector counterparts in structured, peer-level dialogue.

Abdulaziz Albassam occupies a complementary position. As CEO of AIMS Investment, he executes cross-border capital recycling strategies for Saudi family offices, a segment whose sophistication has accelerated markedly in recent years. Saudi Arabia's regulatory environment has evolved to support this trend. Royal Decree No. M/14, the Law on Non-Saudis Ownership of Real Estate, took effect in January 2026, permitting foreign individuals and companies to own property in designated zones across the Kingdom, excluding Makkah and Madinah for non-Muslims. This regulatory opening creates new pathways for inbound capital while simultaneously encouraging Saudi families to diversify outward, deploying domestic wealth into international real estate opportunities. Albassam's firm is positioned precisely at this crossroads, structuring transactions that satisfy both regulatory requirements and the risk-return expectations of ultra-high-net-worth families.

Nader Fares brings a third dimension to the capital matrix. As CEO of LP Bens, Fares manages significant logistics assets in Brazil while serving as a bridge for diaspora capital flows into the GCC. His profile illustrates a phenomenon that conventional market analysis often overlooks: the role of geographically distributed communities of wealth in shaping real estate investment patterns. The Arab diaspora in Latin America, concentrated in Brazil, represents a substantial and increasingly organised source of capital seeking exposure to Gulf markets. Fares operates at this junction, translating cultural affinity into structured investment vehicles.

Together, these four figures represent a map of capital formation in the modern GCC: sovereign wealth setting the strategic tempo, family offices providing scale and speed, diaspora networks adding geographic diversification, and luxury developers creating the product that attracts all three.

What regulatory shifts are enabling this new generation of dealmakers?

The institutional playbook these operators deploy does not exist in a vacuum. It rests on a rapidly modernising regulatory foundation that has expanded foreign ownership rights, strengthened investor protections and raised the bar for developer accountability.

Dubai's Law No. 7 of 2006, updated in 2025, governs property ownership and registration, allowing foreign nationals to purchase freehold property in designated areas. The 2025 amendments expanded freehold zones and introduced stricter escrow and developer compliance regulations. These changes directly support the kind of institutional-grade transactions that Adil Taqi and his peers facilitate. International investors and their advisors require legal certainty before committing significant capital, and Dubai's regulatory trajectory delivers precisely that.

Abu Dhabi has followed a parallel path. Law No. 2 of 2025 revised the earlier Law No. 3 of 2015, introducing stricter escrow account controls and formal pre-termination procedures that developers must follow before terminating off-plan contracts. The emirate recorded total real estate sales of AED 58 billion in the first three quarters of 2025, a 75.8% year-on-year increase according to Kuwait Financial Centre (Markaz). That acceleration correlates directly with the enhanced regulatory environment, a signal that investor confidence and legal infrastructure reinforce each other.

Saudi Arabia's opening through Royal Decree No. M/14 adds a third regulatory catalyst. For dealmakers like Albassam who work with both Saudi and international capital, the decree removes a structural barrier that had historically limited cross-border transaction volumes. The Kingdom's broader Vision 2030 agenda continues to create development opportunities at a scale unmatched elsewhere in the region, and the regulatory framework is now catching up with the ambition.

Regional residential supply in the GCC is expected to increase from approximately 6.26 million units in 2025 to 7.28 million units by 2030, according to Alpen Capital. Absorbing that supply productively requires precisely the kind of sophisticated capital intermediation that Taqi, Chamdia, Albassam and Fares practise. Without institutional bridges connecting developers to diversified capital sources, the risk of oversupply and mispricing rises. With them, the market can allocate capital to its highest and best use.

The strategic implications for GCC real estate leadership

The emergence of this dealmaker cohort carries three implications that GRI Institute members should weigh carefully.

First, the era of the generalist intermediary is closing. The complexity of cross-border GCC transactions now demands operators with deep specialisation, whether in sovereign fund governance, family office structuring, diaspora capital mobilisation or luxury product development. Professionals who combine sector expertise with cultural fluency will command disproportionate influence over capital allocation in the coming decade.

Second, regulatory modernisation is a competitive asset, not merely a compliance burden. The jurisdictions that attract the most sophisticated capital will be those that continue to upgrade legal protections, expand foreign ownership rights and enforce developer accountability. Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia are each advancing on this front, creating a regional race to institutional best practice.

Third, the connective tissue between capital pools matters as much as the capital itself. The GCC's projected growth trajectory, reaching USD 260.3 billion by 2034, will be shaped by the quality of relationships forged in forums where sovereign investors, family offices, developers and diaspora capital converge. GRI Institute's convening role, bringing senior principals together for candid, off-record exchange, reflects this structural reality. The deals that define the next phase of Gulf real estate will originate not from cold outreach but from trust built in curated, high-calibre settings.

Kuwait Financial Centre (Markaz) projects that the GCC real estate market is poised to sustain its upward trajectory into the first half of 2026. The operators profiled here are positioning themselves to capture that momentum. Their playbook, institutional in discipline, global in reach, culturally fluent in execution, offers a template for how the Gulf's real estate sector will professionalise at scale.

The question for the industry is straightforward: who will build the next generation of bridges between capital and opportunity, and on what institutional foundations will those bridges rest?