Portside Square Escrow Account

The Portside Square escrow account is held at Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank under account number 1467*****20002 (the complete number is available through the Show and Copy buttons in the Escrow Details section above). It is registered to DLD project number 4213, shown as Active in the Dubai Land Department register, and the January 2026 progress monitoring report names the same bank as the project's trust account bank.

All instalments under the Portside Square 70/30 plan are deposited into the escrow account: 20 percent at booking; 10 percent at 60 days, 10 percent at 120 days, 5 percent at 240 days and 5 percent at 360 days after the reservation date; 5 percent at each of the 20, 30, 40 and 50 percent construction milestones; and 30 percent on completion. The bank pays funds out to the developer only against construction progress confirmed by DLD inspections, which means the dates on which a buyer pays and the dates on which the developer is paid are independent of each other.

No. The 4% DLD registration fee goes to the Dubai Land Department at the booking stage alongside the 20 percent down payment; it does not sit in the Portside Square escrow account. As a government charge for registering the purchase, it is not part of the price, it is never paid out to Ellington, and it does not count toward any instalment.

Reserving a Portside Square unit starts with an AED 40,000 booking token, payable by UAE cheque or by credit card on Ellington's online payment portal. The developer then issues a receipt together with the booking form. After the buyer completes the down payment and registration fees, the developer sends the Sales and Purchase Agreement in duplicate for signing, and once it is executed Ellington registers the unit with DLD. The booking form and the Sales and Purchase Agreement state how the token is applied against the down payment.

The Project Status service, listed under Services in the Dubai REST app, returns the project when searched by number 4213 or by the name Portside Square. Its record shows the project status and the escrow panel; the bank reads Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, and the account number there should be identical to the one in the Sales and Purchase Agreement. The check takes roughly two minutes.

No. Each off-plan payment for Portside Square has one correct destination: the DLD-registered escrow account 1467*****20002 at Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, as recorded in the Sales and Purchase Agreement (the unmasked number is shown in the Escrow Details section above). An instruction to transfer to a personal account, an agent or a different company account, particularly one offering a discount for bypassing escrow, matches the standard payment-fraud pattern however genuine the paperwork appears. Funds sent that way lose escrow protection, so any such instruction is compared with the Dubai REST record and the agreement before money is transferred.

The DLD register reading for the inspection dated 12 January 2026 is 0 percent, and the inspection note records that no construction activity had started at site. Releases from escrow follow verified construction progress, and at 0 percent the construction-linked instalments, due at 20, 30, 40 and 50 percent completion, had not been reached. Each new reading is tracked on the Portside Square construction updates page.

The escrow account keeps protecting it. Payments already made remain in the account and are still released only against verified progress, regardless of the timetable. Escrow safeguards capital until completion but does not compensate for lateness; delay provisions are written into the Sales and Purchase Agreement. The expected handover for Portside Square is Q4 2029.

Should the Dubai Land Department cancel a registered project, RERA takes control of the escrow account, and refunds to buyers are paid out of the protected balance under DLD oversight. The safeguard extends only to payments made into the registered account, so money transferred elsewhere has no such cover. How the regulator supervises off-plan projects is explained in the Dubai Land Department guide.

The Portside Square escrow account protects only buyer payments deposited into it while the project is under construction. Funds transferred to any other account fall outside it, it provides no compensation if handover runs late, and it offers no assurance on future resale prices or rental yields. The 4% DLD registration fee is not covered either, because it is paid to the land department, not deposited in the trust account.

None of Ellington's completed buildings is in Rashid Yachts & Marina. The best-dated example in Dubai is Harrington House, a 92-residence building in Jumeirah Village Circle; handover there began on 1 November 2022, and Ellington described it as completed ahead of schedule. The developer's announcement also lists Belgravia Heights I (Jumeirah Village Circle), DT1 (Downtown Dubai), Wilton Terraces, and Wilton Park Residences (Mohammed Bin Rashid City) as delivered. Earlier handovers indicate how the developer works; they are not a commitment on the Portside Square handover date of Q4 2029.

The Dubai Land Department register lists the developer of Portside Square as ELLINGTON PCFC MR DEVELOPMENT L.L.C., developer number 2529, and the January 2026 progress monitoring report carries the same name and number. That registered entity is the one recorded against DLD project 4213 and its escrow account at Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank; Ellington is the brand under which the project is marketed.