Quick answer: A CRM for a real estate agency in the UAE has to follow the rules of each emirate it works in. Dubai wants a RERA broker card and a Trakheesi permit on every ad, Abu Dhabi an ADREC licence and a Madhmoun permit, Sharjah registration with SRERD. Set up pipelines, routing, WhatsApp, imports and permissions around those rules, emirate by emirate.
Key takeaways
- Brokerage is licensed emirate by emirate. A Dubai broker card is issued under Dubai's own bylaw; Abu Dhabi licenses brokers through ADREC; Sharjah's market is regulated by the Sharjah Real Estate Registration Department (SRERD).
- Both Dubai and mainland Abu Dhabi require an advertising permit before a property goes online. Your CRM should hold the permit number on the listing, not in an agent's head.
- Property Finder, Bayut and Dubizzle carry listings in all three emirates, so one CRM should take enquiries from all of them into one pipeline, tagged by emirate.
- In the first half of 2025, 55% of new investors in Dubai property did not live in the UAE (Dubai Land Department figures). Language, time zone and WhatsApp habits belong in the lead record.
- A sensible rollout takes about four weeks: stages, routing, WhatsApp, imports, permissions, then reporting. The table below gives the order.
Last checked: 30 October 2026.
What does a CRM for a real estate agency in the UAE actually need to do?
A real estate CRM is the system an agency uses to record every enquiry, owner, listing, conversation and deal, and to make sure the right agent follows each one up. What is particular to the UAE is that each emirate regulates its own property market, so permits and licences change as soon as an agency takes a listing outside Dubai.
This guide is about setting one up for an agency that works across the UAE. If you are still choosing a system, start with our buyer's guides instead: the best CRM for a real estate agency in Dubai covers the checklist for comparing products, and the best real estate CRM in Dubai covers what agents need day to day. We will not repeat either here. For a brokerage working only in Dubai, our companion piece on a CRM for a real estate brokerage in Dubai goes deeper on Dubai alone.
The practical question: you have agents in Dubai Marina, a listing on Al Reem Island and a landlord in Al Majaz. How should one CRM be configured so nothing breaks the rules?
How do the real estate rules differ between Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah?
Each emirate has its own land authority and broker licensing, and Dubai and Abu Dhabi each have an advertising permit. The CRM files nothing with them, but its fields and checks should match them.
Dubai: RERA broker cards and Trakheesi permits
In Dubai, brokers are governed by the Dubai Land Department (DLD) and its regulatory arm, the Real Estate Regulatory Agency (RERA). The DLD's Real Estate Brokerage Practice Guide (issue of November 2024) names Bylaw No. 85 of 2006 regulating the Real Estate Brokers Register in Dubai as the core rule. The same guide sets out how a broker card is issued: the company first obtains a real estate licence, registers it in the Trakheesi system, applies for the broker card there, and the electronic card is issued once fees are paid. We explain the card in detail in our RERA broker card guide.
Advertising is the part that touches the CRM most. The practice guide states that brokerages must obtain a permit for any real estate advertisement or marketing material through Trakheesi, and that the permit number must be displayed on the ad. That includes electronic ads and real estate promotion platforms, so every portal listing. DLD has fined companies for ads without permits, with fines that are progressive and start from AED 50,000 (DLD, October 2020). Each permit also has a QR code that companies must show on written and visual ads, and since GITEX 2024 DLD has run an AI platform that monitors listings on Property Finder, Bayut and Dubizzle; by April 2025 it had checked more than 279,000 ads (DLD, April 2025). Our Trakheesi permit guide covers the application itself.
Two more Dubai rules shape the data you keep:
- Smart contracts A, B and F. The practice guide requires brokers to use RERA's smart contracts: Contract A between the seller and the brokerage, Contract B between the buyer and the broker, and Contract F between seller and buyer. Your pipeline should show which of these exists for each deal.
- The Green List. Through the Dubai REST app, brokers can see owners who have registered to be contacted. The guide says brokers are not allowed to contact owners who are not on the Green List, and a complaint can lead to a violation and suspension. If you prospect owners, record where each owner's number came from.
Abu Dhabi: ADREC licences and Madhmoun permits
Abu Dhabi's market is overseen by the Abu Dhabi Real Estate Centre (ADREC), which runs its services through the DARI platform. The legal base is Abu Dhabi Law No. 3 of 2015 Concerning the Regulation of the Real Estate Sector, amended by Law No. 2 of 2025 dated 1 May 2025. When the 2015 law was issued, it required brokers and brokers' employees to be licensed before carrying out any business, with renewals annually (CMS, November 2015). ADREC's H1 2026 figures, reported in October 2026, put the number of licensed brokers in the emirate at 3,302. In October 2026 ADREC made a new course, the Abu Dhabi Real Estate Broker Transformation Course, the mandatory licensing curriculum.
For advertising, Abu Dhabi uses Madhmoun, which ADREC describes as Abu Dhabi's first verified MLS platform. A Madhmoun permit is needed to advertise a property on listing websites. According to ADREC's DARI help centre, an owner, developer or property management company can grant the permit to a broker, or the broker can request it and the owner approves. If the permit is exclusive, only that broker may advertise the property for the permit's duration. If it is not, up to three brokers can be added, each with their own permit. The effect was visible quickly: Khaleej Times reported in September 2025 that Abu Dhabi listings on the major portals fell from about 75,000 to roughly 20,000 after the rule took hold.
One more detail matters for agencies with Al Reem Island or Al Maryah Island stock: those islands sit inside Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM), which launched its own Advertising Permit service on its AccessRP platform in August 2025, linked to Madhmoun (Aletihad, August 2025). A CRM should let you note which permit regime a listing falls under.
Sharjah: SRERD and the brokerage decree-law
Sharjah's property registrations are handled by the Sharjah Real Estate Registration Department (SRERD), which describes its role as regulating relationships between owners, investors, developers and brokers (Sharjah24, February 2026). Brokerage itself is governed by Sharjah Decree-Law No. 2 of 2018 on the real estate brokerage profession, which repealed the earlier brokers' law and tasked the Sharjah Executive Council with issuing the regulations, fees and penalties (Gulf News, November 2018). The UAE government portal links to SRERD's list of licensed brokers in Sharjah.
Sharjah also differs on ownership. The UAE government portal (updated October 2026) says foreign nationals in Sharjah receive usufruct rights of up to 100 years after registration with SRERD, given only after a special approval from the Ruler, rather than the freehold ownership expatriates can hold in Dubai's designated areas. In Abu Dhabi, the same page says expatriates may own floors and apartments, not land, in nine areas. That is why nationality is a field worth filling in, not an optional extra.
We could not find an English-language official source describing a Sharjah advertising permit equivalent to Trakheesi or Madhmoun, so we have not listed one. Check with SRERD before advertising Sharjah stock.
The three emirates side by side
| What the CRM must reflect | Dubai | Abu Dhabi | Sharjah |
|---|---|---|---|
| Regulator | DLD and RERA | ADREC (ADGM for Al Reem and Al Maryah) | SRERD |
| Main broker rule | Bylaw No. 85 of 2006 (Brokers Register) | Law No. 3 of 2015, amended by Law No. 2 of 2025 | Decree-Law No. 2 of 2018 |
| Broker credential | Broker card through Trakheesi | ADREC licence through DARI | Licence registered with SRERD |
| Ad permit before listing | Trakheesi permit number and QR code | Madhmoun permit (ADGM permit on its islands) | No official English source found |
| Brokers per listing | Not capped in the sources we checked | One if exclusive, up to three if not | Not published |
| Fields to add | Permit no., BRN, Contract A/B/F status, Green List source | Madhmoun permit no., exclusivity, broker licence no. | Ownership type, buyer nationality |
Rule: a broker licensed in one emirate should not be assigned listings or leads in another until they hold that emirate's licence. Build this into routing, not into a memo.
Which property portals should a UAE agency connect in each emirate?
The three big portals are national, not Dubai-only. On 30 October 2026, Property Finder showed 23,940 properties for sale in Sharjah and 13,312 in Abu Dhabi, and Dubizzle runs a Sharjah property section alongside its Dubai and Abu Dhabi ones. DLD's monitoring platform watches Property Finder, Dubizzle and Bayut in Dubai, which tells you where Dubai buyers search.
So the portal mix rarely changes by emirate; the permit each listing needs does. For a CRM, that means three things:
- Every portal enquiry lands in one pipeline, with the portal and the emirate on the lead, so you can compare cost and conversion per portal per emirate.
- Listings carry their permit and cannot be pushed to a portal without it.
- Listing quality is tracked per portal. Each portal scores listings differently; our sibling guides on high-quality listings on Bayut and high-quality listings on Property Finder go through what each one rewards.
In Majlis, enquiries from Property Finder, Bayut and Dubizzle arrive in the same pipeline as WhatsApp, lead ads and website forms, and listings publish to Bayut and Dubizzle from the CRM. The DLD permit number is part of the listing, and a listing cannot go to the portals without one. See the Bayut and Property Finder integration pages for what flows each way.
How should a real estate agency CRM handle multilingual and overseas clients?
A large share of UAE buyers are not in the UAE when they enquire. Dubai Land Department figures for the first half of 2025 counted 94,717 investors, of whom 59,075 were new to the market, and UAE residents made up 45% of those new investors (Dubai Media Office, July 2025). The rest were buying from abroad, which means different time zones, different languages and a strong preference for WhatsApp over calls.
What this means for setup:
- Record preferred language on the contact, and route by it where you can. An Arabic-speaking buyer from Riyadh and a Russian-speaking investor from Almaty should not wait for whichever agent happens to be free.
- Record country of residence and time zone. A follow-up at 10am Dubai time is 2am in Toronto.
- Keep WhatsApp inside the CRM. If chats live only on agents' phones, the record of what was promised leaves when the agent does. Our guide to the WhatsApp Business API for real estate explains the official route.
Majlis's AI translates WhatsApp messages on request, and its voice note button takes a spoken note after a meeting in English, Arabic, Hindi, Urdu or Malayalam and drafts the contact, lead, stage move and follow-up in English for the agent to accept. More on this in the AI assistant feature page.
On cost, WhatsApp itself is billed by Meta. Meta has charged per delivered message since 1 July 2025, and as of October 2026 each business phone number gets 1,000 free service messages a month before service messages are charged (Meta for Developers, pricing page). Majlis adds no per-message fee on top.
What data should a real estate agency capture on every lead?
These are the minimum fields for an agency working in more than one emirate. Some follow from the rules above; the rest make routing, matching and reporting work. Keep the list short enough that agents fill it in.
| Field | Why it matters | When to require it |
|---|---|---|
| Name, phone in +971 format, email | Matching duplicates across portals and WhatsApp | On creation |
| Source (portal, ad, form, referral) | Cost per lead and per deal by channel | On creation |
| Emirate and community of interest | Routing to a licensed agent in that emirate | On creation |
| Rent or buy, ready or off-plan | Pipeline choice and listing matching | Before Contacted |
| Budget (min and max, AED) | Matching and qualification | Before Qualified |
| Preferred language | Routing and message templates | Before Contacted |
| Country of residence and nationality | Time zone, ownership rules in Sharjah and Abu Dhabi | Before a viewing |
| Consent and how the number was obtained | UAE data protection law and Dubai's Green List | On creation |
| Permit number of the listing enquired on | Proof the ad was legal | Automatic from the listing |
| Contract status (A, B, F in Dubai) | Commission is only safe once the contract exists | Before Won |
On consent: the UAE's Personal Data Protection Law, Federal Decree-Law No. 45 of 2021, prohibits processing personal data without the owner's consent, with exceptions, and gives people the right to ask for incorrect data to be corrected and for processing to be restricted or stopped (UAE government portal, updated December 2025). A CRM that records where each number came from and when the person agreed to be contacted makes that easy to show. For outbound calling specifically, read our guide to cold calling rules in the UAE.
Tip: if Budget is required before a lead can move to Qualified, every qualified lead will have one. A required field beats a training session.
How do you set up a CRM for a real estate agency in the UAE, step by step?
Do it in this order: routing needs stages, WhatsApp needs routing, imports need all three, and reports only mean something once the data is clean.
| Step | What to do | Who owns it | Done when |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Map emirates and licences (week 1) | List each agent's licence by emirate, each office, and which emirates you list in | Owner or compliance lead | A table of agent, emirate, licence number, expiry |
| 2. Build pipelines and stages (week 1) | One pipeline per business line (sales, leasing, off-plan), stages with required fields | Sales manager | Every stage has a clear exit rule |
| 3. Set up routing (week 2) | Teams per emirate or language, rotation, response time windows, working hours | Sales manager | A test lead from each source reaches the right agent |
| 4. Connect WhatsApp and portals (week 2) | Company number and agents' own numbers, portal enquiries, lead ads, website forms | Owner | Messages and enquiries appear on the lead |
| 5. Import existing data (week 3) | Leads and contacts into the right pipeline and stage, with owners | Operations | No duplicates, every lead has an owner or sits in the pool |
| 6. Set permissions (week 3) | Lead visibility, exports, WhatsApp read-only where needed | Owner | Agents see only what they should |
| 7. Turn on reporting (week 4) | Agent performance, funnel, weekly email to owners | Owner and managers | First weekly report reviewed in a team meeting |
Stages and routing: the two steps that decide everything
Stages. Most UAE agencies run separate pipelines for sales, leasing and off-plan, because the steps differ. A practical sales pipeline: New, Contacted, Qualified, Viewing booked, Offer made, Contract signed, Won, Lost. Give each stage one exit rule: budget at Qualified, a contract reference at Contract signed, a reason at Lost. In Majlis, any stage can require fields or a note before a lead moves on.
Routing. Group agents into teams such as "Abu Dhabi sales" or "Arabic speakers" and send each source to the right one: an Al Reem listing sends its enquiries to the Abu Dhabi team, a Russian-language Instagram ad to the Russian speakers. Then decide what happens when nobody answers. In Majlis, lead rotation moves a lead nobody contacted in time to the next agent, each team can have its own rotation, a listing, lead ad form, website form or webhook can send its leads to a team, and working hours pause the timers overnight (lead management).
WhatsApp, imports and permissions
Connect the company WhatsApp number first, then agents' own numbers if your policy allows it; on Meta's official Cloud API the WhatsApp Business app keeps working on the phone. Then connect the portals, lead ads, website forms and any chatbot tool (Majlis takes ManyChat and similar tools through webhooks; see the WhatsApp integration). Send one test enquiry from each source and check where it lands.
For imports, clean phone numbers into +971 format and run a small test first. Majlis imports leads and contacts from a spreadsheet into the pipeline and stage you choose, and imports directly from Bitrix24 with its history. Leads whose agent has left go to the General Pool, where any agent can claim them.
Set permissions before agents log in: agents see their own leads plus the pool, team leads their team, owners everything. Agents who should not message clients directly can be given read-only WhatsApp. If client ownership worries you, pair the settings with the policies in our guide on how to stop agents taking clients.
Reporting
Review four numbers every week, by agent and by emirate: response time, leads contacted, viewings done and deals won. Majlis sends a weekly email report to the owners and anyone they add, and its agent performance board shows WhatsApp, calls, notes, meetings, qualified and won leads per agent.
Worked example: a 12-agent agency in Dubai and Abu Dhabi
An illustrative case, not a client: an agency with eight agents in Business Bay and four in Abu Dhabi, selling in Dubai Hills and JVC and leasing on Al Reem Island.
- Teams: "Dubai sales" (eight agents with RERA cards) and "Abu Dhabi" (four with ADREC licences).
- Listings: Dubai listings carry their Trakheesi permit, Al Reem ones their ADGM permit, and both Abu Dhabi kinds route enquiries to the Abu Dhabi team.
- Rotation: a 15-minute window per agent from 9am to 7pm, so a JVC enquiry at 11am untouched by 11:15 moves to the next Dubai agent.
- Commission: an AED 2,400,000 Dubai Hills sale at an agreed 2% gives AED 48,000 gross; split 50/50 between listing and buyer's agent, each share is AED 24,000 before the brokerage's own split. Record it on the deal when it opens.
The 2% is an example, not a regulated rate; see our guide to real estate commission in Dubai.
Where does Majlis fit?
Majlis is a real estate CRM built for Dubai and UAE agencies: portal enquiries, WhatsApp, lead ads and forms in one pipeline; listings that carry their permit and publish to Bayut and Dubizzle; routing with teams, rotation and working hours; and permissions per person. Every feature is in every plan, with no minimum seats and a 14-day free trial. Our real estate agency CRM page shows how it is set up for agencies, or book a demo and we will walk through your own emirates and teams.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a separate CRM for each emirate?
No. One CRM can serve every emirate if each lead and listing records its emirate, and routing sends leads only to agents licensed there. Separate systems make it impossible to see the agency's whole pipeline or to compare emirates.
Can a Dubai RERA broker card be used in Abu Dhabi or Sharjah?
The Dubai broker card is issued under Dubai's Bylaw No. 85 of 2006, while Abu Dhabi's Law No. 3 of 2015 requires brokers to be licensed in Abu Dhabi and Sharjah regulates brokers through SRERD. Treat each emirate as needing its own licence, and confirm with the regulator before an agent works outside the emirate that licensed them.
What is a Madhmoun permit?
A Madhmoun permit is Abu Dhabi's permit to advertise a property on listing websites, issued through ADREC's DARI platform with the owner's approval. An exclusive permit allows one broker; a non-exclusive one allows up to three, each with their own permit.
Should the CRM store the Trakheesi permit number?
Yes. DLD requires the permit number on every Dubai property ad, and it fines companies that advertise without one. Storing it on the listing means it travels to every portal and brochure, and an expired permit is visible before the ad goes out.
How long does it take to set up a CRM for a real estate agency?
For an agency of 10 to 30 agents, about four weeks is realistic: stages and licences in week one, routing and WhatsApp in week two, imports and permissions in week three, reporting in week four. The slowest part is usually cleaning old data for import.
Does UAE data protection law apply to a real estate CRM?
Federal Decree-Law No. 45 of 2021 covers processing of personal data through electronic systems and generally requires consent, with exceptions. Record where each contact came from and when they agreed to be contacted, and take legal advice on your own case.
This is general information, not legal advice. Rules and permit requirements change; check with DLD, ADREC or SRERD before acting.
Sources
- Real Estate Brokerage Practice Guide, Dubai Land Department / RERA, November 2024.
- DLD fines 10 real estate companies and warns another 30 for not adhering to advertising requirements, Dubai Land Department, 20 October 2020.
- Dubai Land Department strengthens transparency with AI-enabled real estate advertising governance, Dubai Land Department, 24 April 2025.
- Abu Dhabi Real Estate Centre, ADREC, accessed 30 October 2026.
- Request a Permit to Advertise on Websites, ADREC DARI help centre, accessed 30 October 2026.
- Abu Dhabi Law No. 3/2015 Concerning the Regulation of the Real Estate Sector (amended by Law No. 2/2025), LexisMiddleEast, accessed 30 October 2026.
- New Abu Dhabi real estate law, CMS, 11 November 2015.
- Abu Dhabi Real Estate Centre launches new broker curriculum, GDN Online, 8 October 2026.
- Abu Dhabi property listings and Madhmoun, Khaleej Times, 11 September 2025.
- Buying or renting an Abu Dhabi property? Check for 'Madhmoun' permits, Gulf News, August 2025.
- Permits mandatory for all real estate ads within ADGM jurisdiction, Aletihad, 21 August 2025.
- Sharjah Ruler issues Decree-Law on real estate brokerage profession, Gulf News, November 2018.
- Sharjah Consultative Council reviews real estate policy, Sharjah24, 17 February 2026.
- Expatriates buying a property in the UAE, UAE government portal (u.ae), updated 27 October 2026.
- Data protection laws, UAE government portal (u.ae), updated 4 December 2025.
- Dubai real estate transactions exceed AED431 billion in H1 2025, Dubai Media Office, 20 July 2025.
- Pricing on the WhatsApp Business Platform, Meta for Developers, accessed 30 October 2026.
- Properties for sale in Sharjah and Properties for sale in Abu Dhabi, Property Finder, accessed 30 October 2026.
- Property for sale in Sharjah, Dubizzle, accessed 30 October 2026.