Emirates REIT refinanced its $400m sukuk down to $205m and returned to record NAV by 2024

Emirates REIT, the UAE's largest listed Sharia-compliant REIT, borrowed $400m through a sukuk issued in 2017, due December 2022. When COVID hit Dubai property, it proposed exchanging the unsecured notes for secured, longer-dated paper — but in June 2021 a group of institutional creditors campaigned against the terms, and the plan was withdrawn after only 57% of voting holders backed it against the required 75%.

The REIT kept negotiating. In December 2022 it completed a refinancing: $380m of new secured sukuk due December 2024, with a one-year extension option and a higher profit rate. It then deleveraged by selling assets — Trident Grand Mall for $20m and Office Park for $196m in 2024 — and making partial redemptions.

In December 2024 Emirates REIT fully refinanced the remaining facility with a new $205m senior secured sukuk due 2028 at 7.5% (stepping to 8.25% in year four), rated BB+ by Fitch. FY2024 results showed the payoff: profit up 64% to $209m, financing-to-value down to 24% — the lowest since 2014 — and NAV up 42% to an all-time high of $708m.

Debt reduced from $400m to a $205m secured sukuk due 2028 at 7.5%; FY2024 profit up 64% to $209m; financing-to-value down to 24%; NAV up 42% to a record $708m.

Securing the sukuk and extending maturity in 2022 bought the time that asset sales needed.

Selling Trident Grand Mall and Office Park generated $216m of proceeds used to repay debt and shrink the sukuk.

Partial redemptions in 2023-24 cut the facility further before the final refinancing.

The cheaper 2024 sukuk — 7.5% versus the stepped-up prior rate — lowered finance costs structurally.

A rejected restructuring is a signal to renegotiate, not abandon: Emirates REIT came back with secured terms, deleveraged through asset sales, and later refinanced cheaper than its original bond.

The deleveraging continued into 2025: financing-to-value fell to 20% from 41% a year earlier, NAV hit a record $857.9m, and first-quarter 2025 net income rose more than sixfold to $149.7m. What began as a bond dispute that threatened the REIT ended as a capital-structure reset that produced some of the best results in its history.