Dubai is a very interesting case. A mid-sized city ruled by a family that can run it like a private enterprise, and it is. If a decision is made to to build something, it can be done with a finger snap even if it means to kill an entire coral reef; no one would dare to say a thing. If a particular project fails, no problem, still plenty of money available to try something else. Stopovers explain mostly hotels and shopping malls, houses have a good deal of buyers from expats working in the booming economy, including the free zones & speculation; the oil rich Abu Dhabi adds fuels on it. I can easily buy a property here borrowing $, though in my view beyond my budget. Credit here is so abundant that banks harass people to get loans. Real interest rate is negative around -10%, dirham undervalued and real overvalued, does not look very interesting for a down payment in Brazil, but a loan for future installments is ok. But I’m not up to this sort of thing.
By no means NE of Brazil can resemble the success of the Dubai hub, NE is meant for other type of tourism. And I’m certainly one of those highly critic of the way the Brazilian government handle things, also true for traffic controls and restrictions, well pointed out. But looking back few years, seems that things a moving in the right direction, with delay or not, the new Natal airport is one of them. Additional capital flowing in for one of the most, if not the most, promising emerging economy is another good signal, including a piece of the abundant cash from the Middle East. At the end, interpretation of signals is a subjective thing, some might be more skeptical, some more optimistic. I’ve no problem with that.