This article covers communications strategy for Dubai property brands. It reports what the Dubai Land Department has published and does not give legal or regulatory advice. Your compliance team or counsel should confirm current requirements before anything goes public.
The direct answer: Dubai requires a permit for real estate advertising, and the Dubai Land Department (DLD) lists many formats that count, including promotional campaigns and launch events. It has not, in the pages we reviewed, said whether a journalist's own story about your project needs one. That gap is the reason property comms teams should sort every piece of content into two piles before it goes out: things you control and pay for, and coverage a reporter writes.
What is a Trakheesi permit, and who has to have one?
Trakheesi is the DLD's system for real estate advertising permits, run through the Real Estate Regulatory Agency (RERA). In a 2020 enforcement announcement, DLD said that all real estate companies and establishments in Dubai wishing to publish any real estate advertisement must apply for a permit through Trakheesi, and that the advertiser bears the consequences if the permit number is not placed in the advertisement.
DLD's own real estate ad permit service page is specific about how wide "advertisement" runs. It lists fourteen permit types:
- Newspaper, SMS, outdoor, vehicle, printed, electronic and billboard advertisements
- Promotional campaigns and classified advertisements
- Open house events, exhibitions and seminars
- Project launch events
- Real estate promotion platforms
The page lists a fee of AED 1,000 plus an AED 20 Knowledge and Innovation fee for most permits, AED 5,000 for a project launch event permit, and a service time of one working day. Brokers need a copy of the marketing contract with the property owner for several of these permit types.
Those figures come from DLD's page as we read it. Fees and rules change, so check the page itself before you budget.
What is a Madmoun QR code?
Madmoun is a verification layer added on top of Trakheesi. DLD announced it on April 18, 2023, describing a QR code issued for any real estate advertisement permit, effective April 24, 2023. From that date, DLD said, real estate companies were expected to feature the QR code on their print and audiovisual advertisements. Scanning it lets a buyer check that RERA approved the advertisement and see details such as the advertising company and the property's specifications.
A later DLD release, from April 2025, restated the rule more broadly: companies must display the QR code on all real estate advertisements, whether visual or written.
So for anything that counts as an advertisement, the working checklist is a permit, a permit number, and a visible QR code.
Does earned press coverage need a permit?
Here is where we have to be careful, and honest about what we could not find.
Earned coverage means a reporter decides to write about your project, chooses the angle, and publishes it under their outlet's name. You did not buy the space. The DLD pages above talk about advertisers, advertisements, campaigns and promotion platforms. None of the pages we reviewed addresses an independent news story written by a journalist.
That does not mean silence equals permission. It means the question is one for DLD or your counsel, not for a PR agency. If you sit near the line, ask before you publish, and get the answer in writing.
The same logic shows up elsewhere in the region. We explain the parallel distinction for health brands in DHA and MOHAP advertising approval versus healthcare PR. Regulated advertising and earned editorial are different things, and mixing them up is the risk.
Where does a press release fall?
It depends on what you do with it, and this is the piece most teams skip.
- Sent to journalists as a pitch or news update. You are giving reporters information. They decide whether to write. This is ordinary media relations.
- Paid distribution or a sponsored article. You pay for placement and control the copy. That looks much closer to the electronic advertisement and promotional campaign categories on DLD's list, so treat it as advertising until someone qualified tells you otherwise. We cover the paid versus earned line in whether press releases are worth it.
- Posted on your own website, social channels or a portal listing. You control the content and it promotes a property. Assume it needs to match the permit and carry the number, and confirm with compliance.
Three separate people usually touch a launch: the sales team, the marketing team and the PR team. Confusion starts when each assumes another one owns the permit. Give one person that job.
Sources: Dubai Land Department's ad permit service page and its October 2020 and April 2025 announcements, all linked in the article.
What does DLD do when advertising rules are ignored?
It has enforced them, and it says so publicly.
In October 2020, DLD reported that RERA fined 10 real estate companies and warned 30 others after inspection campaigns. It said each fine was a progressive AED 50,000 and could reach the point of cancelling a company's licence. The violations fell into three types: not obtaining advertising permits, manipulating the use of permit numbers, and using expired permits.
Monitoring has since become automated. On April 24, 2025, DLD said its AI-powered Real Estate Advertising Governance Platform, launched during GITEX 2024, had monitored over 279,000 advertisements across Property Finder, Dubizzle and Bayut, and that 29% of the monitored listings were automatically modified using artificial intelligence.
We take two things from this. Checks happen at scale, and mismatched details get flagged. A press-friendly headline that does not match your permitted listing is a problem you can avoid.
How should a developer's comms team plan around this?
A practical routine, without claiming to replace legal review:
- Sort content into two piles. Owned and paid material that promotes a property goes through compliance. Earned coverage is tracked, not edited.
- Give the permit one owner. Name the person who requests, renews and records the permit, and who confirms the number and QR code on each asset.
- Keep launch claims consistent. Prices, dates and specifications in a release should match the permitted advertisement and the approved project details.
- Ask reporters for accuracy, not approval. You can correct a fact. You should not edit their story. Our guide on how to earn media coverage in the UAE covers what UAE editors expect, and the general mechanics are in how to get published in online media.
- Get written guidance on gray areas. If you cannot tell which pile something belongs in, ask DLD or your counsel and keep the reply.
What makes property news worth a reporter's time?
The permit question is a compliance job. Coverage is a different job, and it starts with a real story. A tower launch on its own is rarely news, because the market has plenty of them. Angles that give reporters something to write include a verifiable market figure, a construction milestone with a date, a named investor or partner, an unusual design or sustainability fact, or a buyer trend you can source. Every number should trace to a document you can show.
Do not let the permit process become an excuse to say nothing. And do not pitch coverage as a shortcut around advertising rules. Reporters notice, and so do regulators.
The direct answer, for anyone who read this far
Do Dubai property press releases need a Trakheesi permit? Advertising does, and DLD's list of permit types is broad. Whether an independent news story about your project does is a question DLD's public pages do not settle, so ask DLD or your counsel and get the answer in writing. In practice, separate what you control and pay for from what a journalist writes, name one person to own the permit, and keep every claim consistent with the approved listing.
If you want help building a property launch story reporters will actually cover, request a quotation and we will scope it alongside your compliance team.
