Emaar Properties' USD 1.5 billion initial public offering (IPO) of its United Arab Emirates development business was headline news for Q4 2017 (being the largest since the IPO of Emaar Malls in 2014). Emaar launched a number of new off plan projects in 2017, a trend that extends to the wider residential segment, where supply is increasing ahead of demand. By 2020, a total of 570,000 units of new supply could enter the market, representing an average annual increase of 8%. According to Oxford Economics, Dubai's population is expected to grow an average of 3% per annum, this undoubtedly suggests that market absorption rates will be less than the levels of new supply and thus a large number of residential units may be left vacant.