Dubai-it: From a leap of faith to winning a Dubai apartment three years later

Dubai: When Grace Agnew received a call telling her she had won an apartment in Dubai, her first response was understandable – is this a scam? But late last month, as the 51-year-old Kiwi-Brit expat stood at the Dubai Festival City Mall, holding a massive ceremonial key to the studio apartment, that she had in fact won, she remembered a lesson she’s learnt over the years – life has a beautiful way of coming a full circle. The key took her back to the time when living in the UK, she decided to start her own financial consultancy business. “I had my own business and I did go through some challenging times. I was able to get out of that situation and today the situation is quite the opposite actually,” she said. What the difficult times did teach her, apart from personal finance management, was an appreciation for the good times. “When you go through times like that and get through to the other side, it makes you grateful for all that you have,” she said. A leap of faith Dubai, too, has made a massive difference to the financial adviser’s life, and has been another lesson of life coming full circle. She moved to the city three years ago, to be closer to her then fiancé and now husband Mat. Born in Christchurch, New Zealand, to Scottish parents, Agnew first met Mat working at a McDonald’s fastfood outlet in her teens. After being together for some time, life eventually took them on to different paths, with Mat travelling the world and Agnew returning to the UK at the age of 23. “I moved around the UK for some time and worked for some of the top financial advisories there. Eventually, I started my own business,” she said. Twenty-four years later, though, life brought them together again. Agnew took a leap of faith and moved to Dubai to be with Mat, who was starting a new chapter of his own following a divorce and raising his two sons. “Since I am self-employed, I have the flexibility of working at my own hours, but moving to Dubai has just been amazing,” she said. Finding her feet With the time difference from the UK, where most of her clients are based out of, Agnew said that she gradually began to get a sense of the city and the country, which she had visited previously to meet her fiancé. “I work from home, so I really had to make an effort to go out to meet people and make friends. But that’s easy to do in Dubai because you have so many people from different parts of the world. I slowly began discovering the places to go for brunch or dinner and also started exploring places like Fujairah or the Hatta Dam, which I hadn’t been able to do on my trips earlier,” she said. Financially, too, moving to Dubai has made a massive difference to Agnew, with her salary doubling because of the tax break. “It was a difficult decision to make, because I wasn’t sure if it was going to work out, but it’s all worked out so well. I’ve made so many friends here and it’s a really positive place to be. Everyone wants everyone to do well,” she said. ‘I’ve been Dubai-ified’ The standard of infrastructure and facilities has also played a massive role in validating Agnew’s decision to move to Dubai. “I’ve been to a lot of different countries, and Dubai is definitely my favourite. Things here aren’t just five-star, they are 10-star plus! What’s not to love about the city? I’ve been here just three years and I think I have been ‘Dubai-ified’,” she said. “Now, I find out I have won an apartment. As if I needed another reason to love Dubai,” she added. In 2024, Agnew and Mat got married on an impromptu trip to the Seychelles, and today, she says, she sees her future firmly rooted in Dubai. The city has also given her a better work-life balance. Agnew says the ease and convenience of life in Dubai allow her to get more done, while still leaving time to explore the city she now calls home. And as she continues to explore the city, there’s one thing she’s particularly keen to take on next. Learning Arabic. “I’ve promised myself I’m going to learn the language. It’s just a really nice thing to know, as I want to be able to speak to Emiratis and have longer conversations, rather than the short ones I’m having right now. And because I love Dubai and what it’s given to me and I want to give something back,” she said. Even though 10 days have passed since she held the massive ceremonial key to a new apartment in the city, she finds it hard to believe that the place she came to as a leap of faith has so quickly become home. But now, she has the key to prove it.