The moment after the SPA is signed
You have spent two weeks qualifying a buyer, taken them around five launches, sat through three developer presentations, and finally watched them sign the Sales and Purchase Agreement. The booking fee is in the developer’s account. Your buyer is holding a copy of the SPA. Job done?
Not yet. The deal is not legally registered. The buyer’s name is not yet entered into any official DLD record. You, the selling agent, are not yet in any official record either. The commission you have been promised by the developer has not been triggered. And if a co-broking agency brought this buyer to you under a split arrangement, your verbal agreement with that agency has not been documented anywhere the developer will ever see.
That gap — the period between SPA signature and Oqood registration — is where more friction, confusion, and commission disputes arise in off-plan than at any other stage. Understanding exactly how Oqood registration works, and what it does and does not do for you as an agent, is not academic. It is money.
What Oqood actually is
Oqood is Dubai’s real estate registration system for off-plan properties, operated by the Dubai Land Department (DLD), which records and manages contracts between developers and buyers. The word itself translates to “contracts” in Arabic, which tells you its entire purpose in two words.
Unlike traditional title deeds, which are issued upon completion of a property, an Oqood certificate is issued for transactions involving properties still under construction. Think of it as the provisional land register for the off-plan world: it confirms that a specific buyer has a legally recorded, enforceable interest in a specific unit, at a specific price, under a specific payment plan, before a single floor plate has been poured.
Without Oqood, an off-plan transaction in Dubai has no official standing, which leaves the buyer entirely unprotected in case of disputes, project delays, or developer insolvency. That is not hyperbole. All real property units sold off-plan must be registered in the Interim Property Register according to Law No. 13 of 2008 regulating the Interim Property Register in the Emirate of Dubai; failure to register makes the sale void.
So when the SPA is signed, that document is a contract between two private parties. Oqood registration is what makes it real to the DLD.
The registration chain, step by step
This is the sequence every agent needs to have in their head. It is not complicated, but missing any step creates a problem downstream.
Step 1 — Project pre-registration by the developer
Before a developer can sell a single unit off-plan, the project itself must be registered with the DLD. This is handled through the “Request for registration of a real estate project” service, which is processed via the Oqood portal and linked to the regulated escrow account system. Developers must register the project with DLD and obtain RERA approval before signing any sale purchase agreements or collecting payments; selling without prior registration is prohibited.
That pre-registration is also what triggers the mandatory escrow account. Developers must open a project-specific escrow account with a RERA-approved bank, and all buyer payments must be deposited into this account, not into the developer’s general operating accounts. This is the regulated escrow mechanism established under Dubai law — the legal vehicle that ring-fences buyer funds for the life of construction. As an agent, you are not a party to it. But it determines how and when the developer can spend money, which in turn determines the rhythm of commission payments.
The practical check for you: before you take a client to any launch, confirm that the project has an active RERA registration number and an approved escrow account. If the developer cannot provide both, walk. Check the project’s RERA registration number on the Dubai Land Department website, and confirm that the developer has an approved escrow account — all buyer payments must go into this account, not directly to the developer. This is your primary financial protection against developer default. It is also your protection against attaching your name and your client to a project that may be suspended before handover.
Step 2 — SPA signature and booking payment
Buyers choose the unit, agree on terms, sign the SPA, and pay the initial deposit. The booking fee — commonly five to ten percent of the purchase price — must go into the project’s escrow account at this point. The investor signs the Sales and Purchase Agreement with the developer and pays the initial installment as per the payment plan; all payments must be made into the project’s approved escrow account.
For the agent, SPA day is the emotional peak. For the legal and financial machinery, it is the beginning, not the end.
Step 3 — Developer submits to the Oqood portal
After the SPA is signed, the developer is legally responsible for submitting the sale to the Oqood system. The developer uploads the SPA, buyer information, property details, and payment record through the Oqood portal. The submission includes the signed SPA, buyer identification, unit details including project, unit number and size, the payment plan and proof of initial payment, and the escrow account information.
The developer does this. Not the buyer. Not the agent. The obligation sits entirely with the developer, which is important to understand because it means any delay in registration is almost always the developer’s responsibility, not the buyer’s.
Step 4 — DLD review and fee payment
The DLD reviews all submitted documents, verifies project registration, confirms escrow account details, and validates payment records. During this stage, the registration fee is settled. The main cost associated with Oqood is the Dubai Land Department registration fee, which is 4% of the property purchase price — the same statutory fee applied to all property registrations in Dubai. The buyer also pays a small knowledge fee and innovation fee.
Step 5 — Oqood certificate issued
Once DLD processes the application, the system issues a provisional registration e-Certificate by email, confirming that the off-plan transaction has been entered into DLD’s provisional register. The certificate includes unit details, buyer information, payment progress, developer name, and the official reference confirming the buyer’s legal standing during construction.
DLD’s processing time for the registration itself, once submitted via Oqood, is one business day. The bottleneck is never DLD. It is always the developer getting organised enough to submit in the first place.
Step 6 — The 90-day rule
The developer is required to register the SPA in the provisional register within 90 days of signing. That is the regulatory deadline. In practice, many developers register within a few weeks, because the registration is also a condition for releasing commissions in many cases. But not all. If you are past the 90-day window with no confirmation, follow up with the developer in writing. Document everything. An unregistered SPA is a deal that does not fully exist yet in the eyes of the DLD.
Step 7 — Title deed at handover
The Oqood certificate is not a title deed. The final title deed is issued once construction finishes, the building is handed over, and completion is confirmed. The Oqood certificate covers the entire construction period and is the document your buyer needs to prove ownership, apply for financing, or — if they want to exit before handover — arrange a resale. After receiving the certificate, ownership can be reassigned through the system with developer and DLD approval.
What Oqood does not do: the agent’s missing piece
Here is the gap that causes disputes. Oqood records the deal between developer and buyer. It does not record anything about the agents involved. There is no field in the Oqood submission for “buying agent” or “co-broking agency.” The developer’s internal system tracks which agency brought the deal, but that tracking happens in the developer’s own CRM, not in any DLD record. It is entirely within the developer’s administrative domain.
This means that if there is a dispute between two agencies about who introduced the buyer, or what the agreed split was, there is no DLD document to fall back on. The only evidence that exists is whatever was agreed in writing between the agencies before the deal closed.
That is the structural vulnerability in off-plan co-broking. And it bites hardest in exactly the scenarios that are most common in Dubai: a buyer who has been spoken to by two agencies, one of which brought them to a launch event and one of which followed up and walked them through the SPA.
When and how commission is paid in off-plan
Off-plan commission in Dubai comes from the developer, not the buyer. The developer covers the agent’s commission from their marketing budget, which usually ranges from 2% to 8% of the property value depending on the project and the developer’s agreement with the agency.
But it does not arrive in one payment on the day of the SPA.
Developers do not pay commissions at the point of sale; the standard payment schedule ties commission release to buyer payment milestones. Most developers release 50% of the commission after the buyer’s first payment clears and the remaining 50% after the second or third installment. This creates a 30-to-90-day lag between the sale and full commission receipt.
For a co-brokered deal — where the listing agency and the buyer’s agency have agreed to split — this timeline compounds the problem. The listing agency receives the commission from the developer in tranches. The buying agency is then dependent on the listing agency to pass on their share, at the right time, in the agreed amount. There is no developer mechanism that pays both agencies independently. The developer pays one agency. What happens after that is entirely between the two agencies.
This is where splits stall. Not because anyone necessarily intends to delay, but because the listing agency’s own internal processes, cash flow, and priorities determine when the buying agency sees anything. If the split agreement was verbal, or captured in a single WhatsApp message, there is nothing enforceable to point to when the payment is late or the amounts do not match.
Clawback clauses add another layer
Clawback clauses protect developers from commission fraud: if a buyer cancels within 30 to 60 days of booking, the developer claws back 100% of the commission paid. If cancellation occurs within 60 to 180 days, the clawback is typically 50 to 75%. After 180 days, commissions are generally non-refundable.
What happens to the buying agency’s share of a clawed-back commission? Whatever the two agencies agreed — or did not agree — applies. If the split agreement was silent on clawback recovery, you are in a negotiation about who absorbs the loss after the fact. That negotiation happens when both sides are irritated, the deal is dead, and there is no document to point to.
The escrow account and what it means for payment timing
The developer’s regulated escrow account — the legal mechanism that holds all buyer payments under Dubai law — directly affects when developers can disburse anything, including commissions. The escrow account is the central compliance mechanism for off-plan development in Dubai. Every dirham collected from buyers must pass through the escrow account, and every withdrawal must be justified by verified construction progress.
This is relevant to agents because developer commission payments are operationally linked to their cash position, which is linked to their ability to draw from the escrow account. A developer whose project is behind on construction milestones may also be behind on commission disbursements — not because they are withholding, but because the regulated withdrawal mechanism is not releasing funds at the pace the developer anticipated.
That does not give you legal recourse against the developer in most cases, because your commission agreement is with the developer’s sales team, governed by the agent registration and the developer’s agency agreement. But it does mean that understanding the escrow rhythm helps you forecast cash flow and set realistic expectations with your brokerage.
Assignments before handover: another Oqood moment
Off-plan resales — where a buyer sells their unit to someone else before handover — are a significant part of the Dubai market. These transactions go through Oqood as well. You can sell legally with Oqood, the developer’s No Objection Certificate, payment compliance, and the DLD transfer process. The Oqood certificate is transferred from seller to buyer through the DLD, with the developer’s written consent, and a new entry is created in the provisional register.
For agents, this creates a separate commission event. The original developer commission was tied to the first sale. The assignment transaction generates a new commission — typically from the reselling buyer — calculated as a percentage of the transaction value. The agent facilitating the assignment needs to ensure that the existing Oqood record is verified, that the developer has issued the NOC, and that the DLD assignment process is completed before claiming the transaction is done.
A common mistake: treating the assignment as closed at the moment buyer and seller shake hands. Until the Oqood is updated and the DLD has confirmed the transfer, the deal is not legally complete, and any commission tied to completion has not yet been earned.
Co-broking in off-plan: where every dispute begins
The off-plan market in Dubai runs heavily on co-broking. In a sub-agency arrangement, a referring agent passes a client to a listing agent and receives a referral fee, usually 25% to 50% of the total commission. The variations are enormous: 50/50 splits, 60/40 in favour of whoever registered the client with the developer first, flat referral fees, performance-based structures. None of this is standardised by RERA for the agent-to-agent relationship. RERA governs the agent-to-client relationship and the agent-to-developer relationship. What happens between two agencies on a co-brokered deal is governed by whatever the two agencies put in writing.
In practice, many co-brokered deals in Dubai are still agreed by phone call or message thread and confirmed in no formal document. This works — until something goes wrong.
The disputes that reach RERA’s Real Estate Dispute Settlement Centre (RDSC) — or that end up as broken agency relationships — tend to follow one of three patterns:
- The registration dispute: both agencies claim to have registered the client with the developer first. The developer’s record shows only one agency. The other agency has no evidence of their earlier introduction.
- The amount dispute: commission comes in from the developer at a different rate than either agency expected. The two agencies disagree on how to apply the original percentage split to the actual amount received.
- The timing dispute: the listing agency received the first tranche from the developer and passed on the buying agency’s share. The second tranche came in three months later and the buying agency’s portion was delayed, reduced, or never came.
All three of these disputes are caused by the same thing: the split was not documented, signed, and agreed before the SPA was signed.
The VAT question on agency fees
Agents working with professional corporate buyers need to know this: where an agency fee is charged, VAT at the standard rate applies. The developer-to-agency commission in an off-plan sale is a business-to-business service transaction. If your brokerage is VAT-registered — which it should be if it exceeds the registration threshold — VAT applies to the commission you receive. Equally, when one agency pays a split to another agency, that payment is a taxable service fee. Both sides need to be issuing proper VAT invoices. An informal WhatsApp agreement to split a commission does not produce a VAT invoice. This is one more reason to have a formal, signed document governing the split before the deal closes.
What the Oqood registration moment tells you about timing
There is a practical heuristic that experienced off-plan agents use: the Oqood registration date is the clearest objective timestamp on a deal. It is DLD-recorded, verifiable, and not subject to dispute. The SPA signature date is what the developer files and what appears in the Oqood record. The commission clock, the clawback window, and the client’s legal protection all run from that date.
For an agent who co-brokered the deal, the Oqood registration date is also the best anchor for a commission agreement. If the split document says “payable within 14 days of the developer’s first commission tranche being received by the listing agency, with the listing agency to confirm receipt in writing within 5 business days,” you have a measurable obligation. If it says “we will sort it when the money comes in,” you have a conversation that will happen when both sides are under pressure.
The assignment of risk in a delayed registration
When a developer delays Oqood registration past the 90-day window, the buyer is in an uncomfortable position: they have paid money, signed a contract, but have no official DLD record confirming their interest. If you are past the 90-day window with no confirmation, follow up with the developer in writing. As the agent who brought the buyer to this deal, you share reputational exposure if registration does not happen and the buyer feels unprotected.
This is another reason why checking project registration and escrow account status before the launch — not after — is a professional standard, not a courtesy. If the project is not properly registered, the developer cannot legally register the SPA through Oqood at all. A developer is prohibited from signing SPAs or collecting any payments before the project is registered with the DLD. That rule is clear. The agent who puts a client into an unregistered project has a serious problem that no post-hoc paperwork can fix.
The principle that removes the friction
Everything in this article — the Oqood timeline, the escrow architecture, the commission tranches, the clawback clauses, the co-broking split disputes — points toward the same structural weakness in how off-plan deals currently run for agents.
The deal is agreed between parties, the client signs, money moves, and only then do the two agencies sit down to formalise what they owe each other. By that point, the developer has one agency on record. The Oqood system has recorded no agent at all. The client has a certificate. And two agencies are relying entirely on trust and memory to resolve who gets what.
The mechanics of Oqood registration make it very clear when the moment of financial commitment happens: the SPA signature date is the moment the buyer’s obligation begins, the escrow account receives funds, and the commission clock starts. That is the moment before which everything needs to be in writing between the agents involved.
A split agreed, documented, and signed before the buyer signs the SPA — with both agencies named, the split percentage confirmed, the payment trigger defined, and the clawback position addressed — is a split that does not become a dispute. And if the commission can be paid to both agencies simultaneously, at the moment it becomes payable, rather than passing through one agency’s accounts on the way to another, the payment chain is shorter, the exposure is lower, and the relationship between the two agencies survives to co-broke the next deal.
The technology, the process, the conversation, the documentation — all of that should happen before the client sits down to sign. Every other approach is optimistic. And in Dubai’s off-plan market, where projects run for two to four years, optimism has a long time to turn into a dispute.
Sign the split before the client pays. Get everyone paid at the same time. That is the clean deal.
