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Knowledge Base / Property Price Indexes API

Property Price Indexes API v.1

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Value Proposition

The Property Price Indexes API delivers standardized, up-to-date pricing and yield metrics for buildings, master projects, and communities across the Emirate of Dubai. Integrate median sale and rent prices per square meter, as well as capitalization rates, into your applications for market analysis, investment decision‑making, or portfolio management.

Consultations are available upon request for all users interested in API integration (Google Meet / Zoom).

Dubai Marina Cap Rate
Chart of Master Project's Residential Cap Rate

Property Price Indexes API v.1 Documentation

For all users

Full API documentation is available for users according to their needs for search and GET requests to access Dubai’s property market indexes.

Read API doc

Get a Testing API Key

For new users

You can request a testing API key with a 1-week access period to explore the functionality of the Property Price Indexes API v.1.

  • First, register your application and in the field «Description to Smart Indexes API» include a request to receive the testing API key.
  • The current API pricing and License Agreement are also available upon request.
  • After the 1-week testing period, you can sign the License Agreement and proceed with payment for the selected pricing plan to receive a commercial API key.

Register app

Solutions

The main tasks solved with the Property Price Indexes API:

  • Research the current state of Dubai’s real estate market and compare it over time (rolling 24‑month economic data).
  • Obtain commercial information (capitalization rates and prices) by property types and subtypes to assess where: by area, master project, and specific buildings the expected rental payback is higher.
  • Identify trends of growth, decline, or stagnation across Dubai’s real estate market.

Property Prices indexes API provides operational tools for business modeling and for making strategic and tactical investment decisions related to real estate.

Delivered property price analytics grouped in API by geo layers:

  • communities: fields community_name_en, community_number
  • master projects: field master_project_name_en
  • project names: field project_name_en

Notice: In representative analytics for development projects, official DLD titles are used — project_name_en.

Also endpoints in API grouped by:

  • Search PPI endpoints
    Search for property price indexes by geo layers.
  • Periodical PPI endpoints
    Common property price indexes by geo layers and periods (months of years from 2024).

For useful filtering endpoints separated by property type: Residential and Commercial properties.

Total 12 endpoints in Property Price Indexes API v.1.

PPI = Property Price Indexes.

Search PPI endpoints

Periodical PPI endpoints

Accurate values of real estate prices

The Property Price Indexes API covers all recorded transactions that match your filters, avoiding distortions in Car Rate assessment. Analytical outputs are produced directly from original Sales Transactions and Rent Contracts (Dubai Land Department).

Functionality

Retrieve price per m² rates for sales and rents of residential and commercial real estate by communities, master development projects, and specific buildings (project names).

Users can also search for a building using its Project Name (en), Project ID, Project Number, Parcel ID.

Key capabilities and filters

In functionality of Property Price Indexes includes next key capabilities and filters:

  • Granularity: community, master project, development project.
  • Property type and subtype (e.g., flat, villa, stacked townhouse, office, shop, showroom).
  • Time periods: month, quarter, year; historical comparisons (up to 24 months).
  • Currencies: AED and USD.
  • Search by names in English and by community number (3‑digit official code).
  • Search by parcel id (plot number), project number, project id.

Structure of Property Price indexes: Community → Master project → Development project / Building (Project name) → Property subtype

Property Price Indexes API helps business analysts track trends in the Dubai real estate market, taking into account seasonal and event fluctuations, in order to learn how to choose the right time to buy/rent real estate properties to increase business profitability.

Structure of Property Price indexes

Community → Master project → Development project (Project name) → Property subtype

Levels of detail

In fact, the Property Price Indexes API provides four levels of detail for prices/sq.m. of sales and rent:

  • communities,
  • master projects,
  • development projects,
  • real estate subtype.

This will allow you to directly assess which real estate format is more profitable in the medium term for business.

The API helps analysts answer the key investor question: where in Dubai and which property formats best fit short‑term and long‑term strategies, for retail, warehouses, and other business uses.

API Version

Current version: v1 (released February 25, 2026)

Help & support

If you have questions about the API or want to upgrade to a paid plan, please contact us at support@smartindexes.com.

 

Formula to calculation Cap Rate

In Property Price Indexes API used next formula specially for Dubai's property market:

Formula to calculation Cap Rate

where X is the Operating Expense Ratio (OER) as a share of gross annual rent.

Units & assumptions

  • Annual rent per m² counted by actual area.
  • Area cancels out, so the per m² formulation is valid.
  • X is used as a universal cost identifier, determined by the age of the building (more precisely, by the year of completion of construction according to the building characteristics from the official DLD dataset).

Rate Calculation Features

If a property has recorded rental transactions in the current month but no sales, the Cap Rate is calculated using the most recent available median sale value from the previous month for the same level (community/master/project), real estate segment, and format.

If no sales have ever been recorded prior to the selected period, the Cap Rate remains empty.

Conversely, if there are sales but no rentals recorded in the current month, the same rule applies using the most recent available rental median.

Currency conversions assume a fixed rate of 1 USD = 3.67 AED (UAE dirham peg).

Property type aggregates

Metrics for commercial and residential are calculated separately (via distinct endpoints) across all relevant deals, excluding records with an unspecified subtype.

Usage & Licensing

  • Access to the Property Price Indexes API is commercial and governed by your Smart Indexes subscription plan.
  • Rate limits, data quotas, and feature access depend on your chosen economic plan.

Data exports (Excel/CSV)

For statistical and audit firms, we optionally provide tabular data extracts in Excel (.xlsx) or CSV (.csv). Exports can be scheduled or on-demand and include stable schemas and a concise data dictionary.

  • Formats: .xlsx, .csv (UTF-8)
  • Coverage: Communities, Master Projects, Development Projects (Existing Property)
  • Frequency: monthly, or quarterly
  • Delivery: secure download link (by request)

Property Price Indexes updates

Monthly after updating the Sales Transactions, Rent Contracts (Dubai Pulse) datasets in real-time mode.

Examples of API

Below are three representative JSON examples showing the full set of fields available for analysis and in-app filtering.

JSON Examples

{
            "community_number": 346,
            "community_name_en": "BUSINESS BAY",
            "community_name_ar": "الخليج التجاري",
            "period": "2026-01",
            "residential_sales_price_sqm_aed": 28540.98,
            "residential_rent_price_sqm_aed": 1483.52,
            "residential_sales_price_sqm_usd": 7776.83,
            "residential_rent_price_sqm_usd": 404.23,
            "residential_cap_rate": 4.86,
            "residential_flat_sales_price_sqm_aed": 28550.38,
            "residential_flat_rent_price_sqm_aed": "",
            "residential_flat_sales_price_sqm_usd": 7779.39,
            "residential_flat_rent_price_sqm_usd": "",
            "residential_flat_cap_rate": "",
            "residential_villa_sales_price_sqm_aed": "",
            "residential_villa_rent_price_sqm_aed": "",
            "residential_villa_sales_price_sqm_usd": "",
            "residential_villa_rent_price_sqm_usd": "",
            "residential_villa_cap_rate": "",
            "residential_stacked_townhouses_sales_price_sqm_aed": "",
            "residential_stacked_townhouses_rent_price_sqm_aed": "",
            "residential_stacked_townhouses_sales_price_sqm_usd": "",
            "residential_stacked_townhouses_rent_price_sqm_usd": "",
            "residential_stacked_townhouses_cap_rate": "",
            "residential_building_sales_price_sqm_aed": "",
            "residential_building_rent_price_sqm_aed": "",
            "residential_building_sales_price_sqm_usd": "",
            "residential_building_rent_price_sqm_usd": "",
            "residential_building_cap_rate": "",
            "residential_sales_price_sqm_aed_monthly_growth_rate": [
              { "value": 820.16, "kind": "absolute", "unit": "AED/sqm" },
              { "value": 2.96, "kind": "percent", "unit": "%" }
            ],
            "residential_rent_price_sqm_aed_monthly_growth_rate": [
              { "value": 30.03, "kind": "absolute", "unit": "AED/sqm" },
              { "value": 2.07, "kind": "percent", "unit": "%" }
            ],
            "residential_sales_price_sqm_usd_monthly_growth_rate": [
              { "value": 223.47, "kind": "absolute", "unit": "USD/sqm" },
              { "value": 2.96, "kind": "percent", "unit": "%" }
            ],
            "residential_rent_price_sqm_usd_monthly_growth_rate": [
              { "value": 8.18, "kind": "absolute", "unit": "USD/sqm" },
              { "value": 2.07, "kind": "percent", "unit": "%" }
            ],
            "residential_cap_rate_monthly_growth_rate": [
              { "value": -0.1, "kind": "absolute", "unit": "pp" },
              { "value": -2.02, "kind": "percent", "unit": "%" }
            ]
          }

In Property Price Indexes API v.1 used official titles of development projects from DLD (datasets Projects Open, Buildings Open: project_name_en).

DLD identifiers

For filtering data in PPI API v.1 there are a common range of semantic and numeric identificators:

  • For communities:

    field community_name_en — official title from DLD.

    field community_number — 3-digit identificator from DLD, where first number identify the sector number of official administrative Dubai's layer.

  • For master projects:

    field master_project_name_en — official title from DLD.

  • For development projects:

    field project_name_en — official title from DLD.

    field project_number — official numeric property identificator from DLD useful to connect with Sales Transactions, Rent Contracts.

    field project_id — official numeric property identificator from DLD useful to connect with Buildings Open, Projects Open.

    field parcel_id — official numeric identificator for development land plot from DLD useful to connect with Buildings Open, Projects Open.

Building Identification Notice

The Smart Indexes team has made a deliberate decision not to include Makani Number building identifiers in PPI API v1 in order to preserve a clean, efficient, and lightweight JSON response structure.

Introducing Makani data as a separate dictionary (hashmap) would require additional cross-endpoint requests, which could increase latency and negatively affect standard GET response performance.

The combination of project name (EN), project ID, project number, and parcel ID provides sufficient coverage to ensure accurate and reliable matching with official Dubai Land Department (DLD) datasets.

Upon request, an advanced version of the API can be developed that includes a Makani index or a structured building-level dictionary linked to transaction records for each property where transactions were recorded within a selected historical period. Such an extended configuration is intended primarily for specialized investment analytics and institutional use cases.

FAQ

How do I assess which area is best to buy an apartment for rental?

Use a simple ranking workflow:

  • Rank locations by sale price per m² and shortlist areas that fit your purchase budget.
  • Within the shortlist, sort by residential Cap Rate (subtype: flat) from highest to lowest.
  • Select the community → master project → specific projects of development (project name / parcel id / project number) where the price–payback balance is strongest.

For a professional selection, also factor in transport accessibility and location risks (traffic accidents, crime statistics, flooding). This balances: price ↔ yield ↔ risk.

Which Cap Rates should I target?

Start with your strategy and asset profile:

  • Fix the property type (residential/commercial) and subtype (flat, villa, office, shop, etc.).
  • If your strategy isn’t set, align to goals:
    • Short-term investment — faster payback;
    • Long-term investment — stability over time;
    • Max-yield investment — maximizing returns within a defined period.
  • Then match your entry price and expected Cap Rate to the needs of your target tenants.
Why is the historical window limited to two years?

24 months is typically sufficient to capture trends and seasonality for market analysis. For deeper research, an extended historical extract can be provided on request (via Excel/CSV exports).

What drives year-over-year Cap Rate fluctuations?

Cap-rate dynamics reflect multiple factors:

  • Demand seasonality (tourist inflows) and weather patterns affecting short-stay housing.
  • Business events/cycles influencing demand for offices, retail, and warehouses.
  • Location-specific features (transport accessibility, traffic incidents, crime statistics, flood exposure).

Explaining movements requires analysis of the specific case; there is no one-size-fits-all driver.


Contact us to register your app

To register your application and obtain API credentials or to book a short consultation reach us via Google Meet, WhatsApp, or email.

Also you can Register App using web form right now.

Email: support@smartindexes.com

Subject:

Please include:

  • Company / contact name and role.
  • Use case (research, pricing, underwriting, portfolio, etc.)
  • Data scope (Communities, Master Projects, Project Names; residential/commercial; subtypes).
  • Estimated monthly requests / throughput.
  • Preferred plan (Starter Lite / Medium / Business Plus) and desired start date.
  • Whether redistribution/embedding rights are needed.

We’ll reply with next steps, pricing, and access instructions.

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