TRG Dubai agent Adar Bar greeted by his parents at Sydney Airport last night, on the first flight out of Dubai.
Just a fortnight after announcing the launch of his Dubai office, TRG founder Gavin Rubinstein has pulled his agents back from the Middle East “for a few weeks only”.
“They’re back in Sydney, I’ve met with them and they’re happy to be home with family,” Rubinstein said.
The two agents are Matt Kemeny, who had worked with Rubinstein at his Rose Bay HQ, and a former TRG sales associate Adar Bar, who both arrived on the first commercial flight out of the war zone, EK414, at 10.30pm last night with 200 others. Some had reportedly paid $100k to escape.
But he said his plan to launch an office in “the place where dreams come true” was “full steam ahead .. they can’t wait to get back there”.
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Adar Bar had been in Dubai for six weeks.
Matt Kemeny arrived back in Sydney on the same flight at 10.30 last night.
Rubinstein had only just signed the lease for the luxury real estate brand’s first international bureau before the bombs started falling, and the wunderkind admits it’s a bit of a blow.
“Obviously it’s not an ideal situation, but we want safety for everyone,” he said.
“These are factors out of anyone’s control, but life in general can be a spanner in the works.
“I’ve been in business long enough to know that nothing ever really goes to plan, but this won’t stop us — what you do is you pivot, you adjust and you move forward.”
He said he had confidence in the local UAE government and he was just pleased that no-one had been injured.
“Thank God, there’s been no damage to anyone,” he said.
Gavin Rubinstein, with Dubai highrise in the background, says his agents will be back in Dubai as soon as possible. Picture: Instagram.
Kemeny and Bar had arrived in Dubai six weeks ago ahead of the launch.
Rubinstein said construction of the new office, by architecture firm Esoteriko which had designed their Rose Bay base, was underway but not yet quite finished.
The new 120sqm space is in Happiness St, City Walk, which Rubinstein says will be “very special”.
The signage will feature the firm’s signature phrase “Welcome Home” in English and Arabic.
Rubinstein says he’d got the idea to open the office more than two years ago after an approach from an Australian contact in the UAE. “ But Matt and Adar were the ones to bring it to light,” he said.
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