Are smart city projects in Mauritius hyped?

@Ottomus we are talking about roughly 32 000 applications in 2019, the year before covid, so not a small number by any means.

If you read the T’s and C’s of the Smart City Scheme, it definitely offers some tax and other advantages above the other IRS/RES/PDS/IHS/G+2 schemes when it comes to the purchase of office and co-working space, residential appartements, and even plots of serviced land upto 2100 square metres on which you are not obliged to build immediately.

The only SCS that failed / was not completed that I know about was Mon Trésor near the Holiday Inn and the Airport, and there the safety net worked as intended and when the developers could not complete the project, the clients got back their money that was held in Escrow.

As for the pressure to “sign the contract now to secure your property - there is only one left”, a lot of marketing hype and estate agent tactics are also the order of the day, so take your time, do not be pressurised, go and see and compare 3 or 4 more (or 10 more) properties in different areas all over the island before you make your final decision

- personally we much preferred the quieter Pointe d’Esny / Blue Bay area (South-East) to the busier areas of Pèreybére/Grand Baie/Mon Choisy (North) or Black River/Tamarin/Flic-en-Flac (West) that are popular with most expats.

Our second choice would have been Poste Lafayette in the North-East (OUTSIDE of the busy Azuri / Roches Noires development).

read more about the advantages Smart City Scheme in these articles:

1

https://www.gostartbusiness.com/mauriti … 0new%20tab)

2

https://residency.mu/acquire/smart-city-scheme/

3

https://m.remax24.com/news/smart-city-s … mauritius/

4

https://parklane.mu/en/foreign-acquisition.html

@ceresiet - Thank you for your time to write such detailed message about this topic and your willingness to help.

What are these applications you refer to? Applications for what exactly?

I am quite convinced about the advantages settling in Mauritius with all the property schemes and the incentives to buy.

Honestly what puts me off is the local mentality. What you call sales and marketing tactics, I experienced already and I find it a sleazy way of doing business (pardon my french). Makes me wonder if I can trust local people and if business is conducted in an open and fair manner? My initial impression is that for a plot of residential land the price for a foreigner is much more than for a local (considering that both foreigners and locals can buy that plot). I think that is even illegal to do since to my knowledge the land surveyor would have to verify the size of the plot and if then a fair price is paid, meaning not too low and not too high. Is that true? If Mauritius wants to seriously present itself as a good country to do business in, then real estate agencies and property developers should get their act together and show they are open, trustworthy and quote the right price to locals and foreigners alike. Otherwise, foreigners should and will stay away! 

Indeed ANY property that an Expat / Etranger is allowed to buy comes at a premium - but if you spend at least USD 375 000 (or USD 200 000 on a PDS for assisted living if you are over 50), then you are also buying a Residence Permit for yourself and your family.

In a sense the higher prices and restrictions to only be allowed to buy within certain property schemes are measures to PROTECT the local citizens against foreigners just coming in and sort of “buying up the whole island” at prices that are cheap by foreign standards.

This has happened in places all over the world and sometimes even leading to locals paying rent to foreigners who now own the homes that they used to own - google for “Gentrification of Chicago inner city” for example.

Plots of land: you will not be allowed to buy that same plot of land that the local can buy unless it has been designated for one of the expat schemes IRS/PDS/RES/G+2 and those schemes mostly sell fully built appartements/duplexes/bungalows/villas and not plots.

This one of the advantages of the Smart City Scheme where it allows the purchase of serviced plots, and of a larger size - upto 2100 square metres (= 0.6 Arpent = 83 perches = 552 toises).

In my experience, the estate agents (immobilière) in Mauritius are LESS pushy than those in my previous country - if you are. o longer interested they do not continue hounding you with whatsapps and emails , and one we worked with is very professional- showed us the places we wanted to see and sat back for us to make our own decision - no hard-sell approach.

links to a few reputable estate agents:

https://www.nestenn.mu/en/buy-mauritius … 184?cy=mur

Diana

https://m.remax24.com/results/agent/64/ 

Philna

https://parklane.mu/en/our-team.html

Joelle

https://www.sothebysrealty.com/eng/asso … -de-balyon

Josephine

@Ottomus - short answer - yes. 

Long answer - this is not unlike other countries that have "golden" visa or other offerings.  Please google "golden visa Malta" and there are many schemes aimed at attracting foreign currency.

Do real estate agents oversell those property schemes?  Yes, but this is what they do and the usual "buyer-beware" caution applies here too.

I go back to Mauritius regularly for family and the beaches and I wandered into the Saint Geran - the One and Only presentation once.  And I got a flurry of emails describing incentives, meetings, etc...  I expect that it would be the same for smart city projects - trying to sell at or above the price requirement for the visa scheme.

I think that you should choose where you would want to stay first before you decide to buy into any real estate schemes.

The good thing is that you don't have to buy to be able to stay in Mauritius.  There are other categories for residential visas and you can choose.

Good luck in whatever you choose.