Located across the road from Abu Dhabi’s Al Wahda Mall, Bloom’s new complex, Bloom Central, is hard to miss.
Made up of the capital’s new Marriott hotel, offices, serviced apartments and housing, the development sits on Airport Road, on a crossroads between one of the city’s biggest shopping centres and one of its largest public hospitals.
For renters, there are a couple of options to choose from. Firstly, the 64 serviced Marriott executive apartments offer one, two and three-bedroom suites.
Fully furnished, they come with all the modern conveniences you might need – a spacious lounge, kitchen with a washing machine and dryer. And the usual headaches with setting up a home are also removed.
“Usually when you first come to the UAE you need Emirates ID to get Etisalat to connect your internet,” says Susan Huisink, marketing manager for the executive apartments. “Here we provide free internet already in the apartment. We provide sheets, kitchenware and even groceries so you can come here and move in with just a suitcase.”
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See a gallery of the apartments here.
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Marriott staff clean the apartments twice a week and can provide room service for an additional fee as well as grocery shopping and a laundry service.
All the apartments also come with access to a residents’ lounge and a separate swimming pool exclusively for executive apartments will open soon.
But all of these services come at a hefty cost. Monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment is an eye-watering Dh17,000 – that’s Dh204,000 a year. By comparison, a four-bedroom villa in the same area is currently being advertised on Dubizzle for Dh210,000 a year.
For those staying in Abu Dhabi for the longer term, Bloom has a second option: 49 two-, three- and four-bedroom apartments for lease.
Unlike the serviced apartments, these come unfurnished and are a little more at par with the rental market. A three-bedroom flat will set you back Dh180,000 a year.
Q&A:
Sameh Muhtadi, the chief executive of Bloom Holding
Is there really a demand for the expensive Marriott executive apartments?
Those are longer stay rooms. They are rented out typically on a per month basis. In Abu Dhabi that has been one of the more successful components of the hospitality business. We expect a high 90 per cent occupancy rate by the end of the year. I guess that now it’s around 50 per cent.
What about the Bloom Residences?
We’ve already leased about 50 per cent of those. What’s unique about them is that the services from the Marriott Hotel are made available on a menu basis to the apartments. We’ve only been leasing for a month and we are just putting up the signs now to advertise.
How do these apartments compare with rental prices elsewhere in Abu Dhabi?
I would say we are at average for Abu Dhabi. We might be less than the Corniche area but a bit more expensive than in the Sports City area. The apartments are unusually large.
How about the office element of the building?
We have 7,000 square metres of offices. Rentals are in the Dh1,300 range for core and shell and the Dh1,750 per metres range fully finished. Around 60 per cent of the commercial has been leased, but that includes the fact that we have leased out one 1,000 square metres floor to our holding company Bloom Holdings.
lbarnard@thenational.ae
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