Kingdom Holding kickstarts Riyadh residential city

Price Alwaleed said the Riyadh megaproject will bring 'promising returns' to investors. (Getty Images)

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Kingdom Holding Company is to begin work on the 1,600ha  Kingdom Riyadh Land project, the chairman, HRH Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz Alsaud, said on Wednesday.

The enormous residential project is one of two that Kingdom Holding is developing, with another 200ha project also underway in Jeddah. Together, the two projects are expected to attract more than $19.9bn from investors over the next few years.

“The Riyadh mega project will bring promising returns to Kingdom Holding investors. Our Saudi real estate projects are solid anchors for Kingdom Holding’s continuing profitability,” said Price Alwaleed in a statement.

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There are currently in excess of 400 families on the waiting list for the current residential compound.

In addition, a comprehensive study of the market and the economic implications of the project have led to the Real Estate Investment Company, the owner and operator of the Kingdom City residential compound in Riyadh, to acquire a loan from Banque Saudi Fransi to finance a second Kingdom City.

“This strategic step is aimed at broadening the activities of the Real Estate Investment Company and to benefit its marketing and operations ability,” Talal Almaiman, executive director for Development and Domestic Investments for REIC, said.

The second city will be developed to provide increased facilities for residents to benefit from the infrastructure and other planned projects by the developers, with co-operation from the concerned parties.

In February 2011, Kingdom Holding announced that Omrania, an architectural and engineering consulting firm based in Saudi Arabia, had been awarded the master plan design and infrastructure contract for Kingdom Riyadh Land.

The contract also includes provisional sums for traffic and environmental studies. As part of their service, Omrania’s contract will include the coordination and approval of all master planning elements, as well as liaison with local authorities.

The consultancy will also supervise all the infrastructure work on site.