The holder category is read off the state, not off the fund.

A fund seated in one of the centres is, to the state in which its asset sits, a foreign person of a particular kind. The state's ownership law decides what that kind of person may hold, where, up to what share and on what conditions, and the answer differs by state, by asset class and by the category the state assigns. Nothing about the fund's own regime travels with it across the border, and nothing about one state's regime travels into the next. The centre's licence, the tier, the regulator's notification, the professional register: none of it is a fact the asset state's registry recognises. A vehicle that may hold in one state has learned nothing about the next, and a manager who carries the answer across a border has carried a sentence from one law into another that does not contain it.

This note sets out the four states' lists in their own terms, the Kingdom's 2025 law and its categories, Qatar's areas and its foreign investment law, Kuwait's company limit and its 2025 decree, and India's construction-development rules; the two errors a manager makes; how the registry reads a contract; the design of one holder per state; the exit read as a category question; what each category costs to maintain; a comparison; a worked platform as a type; cases; what each party holds; the sequence; questions; terms; and what to read.

The Kingdom's list

Royal Decree M/14 of 1447H, the Law of Real Estate Ownership by Non-Saudis, in force from January 2026, lists who may own real estate and other in-rem rights, usufruct and easement among them. Non-Saudi natural persons, resident or not. Non-Saudi companies, with or without a branch in the Kingdom. Non-profit entities and diplomatic missions, on conditions. Saudi companies with non-Saudi shareholders. And special purpose vehicles and funds with non-Saudi holders. Each holds within the geographic scope the Council of Ministers and the Real Estate General Authority fix: the areas, the maximum percentages and the maximum usufruct durations, with Riyadh and Jeddah opened within specified areas and the two holy cities confined to Muslim individuals and Saudi companies with non-Saudi shareholders in specified areas. Registration in the real estate registry is mandatory. A disposition by a non-Saudi owner carries the five per cent transaction tax and a further charge of up to five per cent. Penalties run to five per cent of the right's value capped at ten million riyals, and misleading information to ten million riyals and a forced sale by auction.

Beside it, the Investment Law of 1446H registers a foreign investor on the same terms as a domestic one, subject to a list of excluded activities, and the Companies Law of 1443H governs the company a foreign investor forms. A fund seated in a centre that wants a Saudi parcel reads the three together: the registration for its vehicle's standing, the companies law for its form, and the 2025 law for whether that vehicle, as a fund or special purpose vehicle with non-Saudi holders, may own in that area at that percentage for that term.

Qatar's list

Qatar's regime for non-Qatari ownership of real estate is a list of areas: nine in which a non-Qatari person may own outright, sixteen in which it may hold a usufruct for ninety-nine years, and the rest of the State, in which it may hold neither. The list is the instrument, and a parcel's position on it is the first fact in the parcel's file. The foreign investment law of 2019 approves a foreign investor in a Qatari business, which governs the parcel companies' ownership where they are onshore companies. The funds law of 2002 requires the central bank's authorisation and the Minister's approval for a fund investing in Qatari real estate, with non-Qatari participation at percentages the Minister sets, which is why a foreign platform holds through companies rather than through an onshore fund. A fund seated in a centre reads the area list for the parcel, the 2019 law for the company, and the funds law for what its platform must not become.

Kuwait's list

Kuwait's Companies Law No. 1 of 2016 and its Commercial Law set a default limit of forty-nine per cent on non-Kuwaiti ownership of a Kuwaiti company, which a licence under Law No. 116 of 2013 from the investment promotion authority may raise to full ownership in non-restricted sectors. Its real estate law, Law No. 74 of 1979, restricts non-Kuwaiti ownership, and Decree No. 195 of 2025 opens it to two holders only: companies with non-Kuwaiti partners that are listed on a licensed Kuwaiti exchange, and real estate funds and investment portfolios licensed by the competent authorities whose activities include dealing in real estate; private housing land is excluded for both. A fund seated in a centre that wants a Kuwaiti parcel reads the 1979 law and the decree for the holder, which is a licensed scheme, and the companies law and the 2013 law for any Kuwaiti company it will own.

India's list

India's foreign-investment rules permit a foreign-owned Indian company to hold land for construction-development under the automatic route, subject to a three-year lock-in per tranche, pricing rules on transfers between residents and non-residents, and the prohibition on real estate business, which is dealing in land to profit from the dealing itself. A non-resident may not hold agricultural land, a farmhouse or plantation property. A non-resident Indian or an overseas citizen may hold immovable property directly other than those, and on a non-repatriation basis is treated as domestic capital. A fund seated in a centre that wants Indian land reads the construction-development rules for its company, the pricing rules for its entry and exit, and the agricultural prohibition for what it may not hold at all.

The two errors

The first error is to solve the category once and carry the answer across a border. A fund that may hold a parcel in Riyadh through a Saudi vehicle with non-Saudi holders may not hold one in Kuwait City through the same arrangement, because Kuwait's decree does not include it. A holding company that qualifies as a foreign investor in Doha under the 2019 law is not a person the Kingdom's registry knows. A structure that holds Indian land through a company it owns has chosen the right holder in India and the wrong one everywhere else.

The second error is to solve the category for the holding period and not for the exit. A category that permits the vehicle to own may not permit the buyer the vehicle has in mind to own, and a sale to a non-permitted buyer is a sale the registry will not record. The Kingdom's buyer registers under the 1446H law and holds under the 2025 law's areas; Qatar's buyer must be a permitted holder in the area and, for a usufruct, must have the grantor's consent to the assignment; Kuwait's buyer must be a listed company with non-Kuwaiti partners or a licensed scheme; India's buyer, if resident, pays no more than the certified value. The exit is a category question read at entry.

How the registry reads a contract

A contract to buy, signed by a vehicle in the wrong category, is a contract the registry will not record, and a contract the registry will not record is an asset the fund does not own, whatever it paid and whatever counsel in the centre opined. The registry reads the category against the instrument that creates it and against the registry's own practice, which is what the registrar does on the day: the documents it requires, the form of the vehicle it accepts, the percentage it checks, the area it confirms, the language and the notarisation. Counsel in the state reads the practice as well as the law, before the contract, and the contract is drafted to be recordable or it is a conversation with a price attached. The registrar's clerk is the last reader of the structure, and the structure is drafted for the clerk.

One holder per state

The design is one holder per state, each designed to that state's category before the exposure statement is final, and a chain above them that the lender, the acquirer and the tax adviser can each read. In the Kingdom, a Saudi vehicle within the 2025 law's categories and the scope document's areas, or a Saudi private real estate fund as the permitted holder with the platform as its unitholder. In Qatar, a company in a named area under the 2019 law, held by a Centre fund. In Kuwait, a licensed scheme with dealing among its activities, with the platform as its unitholder. In India, a construction-development company under the automatic route, with the lock-in and the pricing rules carried. Where a state's category can be satisfied only by a vehicle the manager cannot lawfully form, the asset leaves the seed list, and the exposure statement is written without it.

Why the states list rather than permit

Each Gulf state's ownership law is a list because each state has decided which foreign holders it wants in which places, and a list is how a state expresses a decision of that kind. The Kingdom's 2025 law lists the persons and leaves the areas, percentages and durations to a scope document the executive can amend, so that the opening can be widened or narrowed without new legislation. Qatar's area list is the State's map of where foreign ownership serves its plans. Kuwait's decree names two holders because the legislature was willing to open land to those two and no others. India's rules permit development and prohibit dealing because the policy is to attract capital that builds. A manager who reads the lists as obstacles has misread them; they are the states' decisions, and a structure that fits the decision is recorded, and one that does not is not.

The lists also change, and they change in the direction the states choose. The Kingdom's 2025 law replaced a 2000 law that was narrower; Kuwait's 2025 decree opened what the 1979 law had closed; Qatar's area list has been extended. A structure reads the list as it stands on the day and keeps counsel in the state on a watching brief, because a category that does not exist today may exist next year, and a seed removed for want of a category may return.

The Saudi private real estate fund as the holder

Where the parcel is Saudi, the platform may choose between a Saudi vehicle within the 2025 law's categories and a Saudi private real estate fund under the Capital Market Authority's regulations as the holder. The fund is itself a permitted holder, with non-Saudi unitholders within the law's treatment of funds with non-Saudi holders, and it is managed by a Saudi-licensed capital market institution under the regulations' own duties: valuation, reporting, a fund board, the private placement rules for its own units. The platform above is a unitholder admitted under those rules through a distributor. The choice is read against four things: the areas, because the fund's holding is within the scope document like any other; the register, because the fund's units are placed under the Kingdom's regime; the manager, because the Saudi-licensed manager is a party with its own duties and its own economics; and the exit, because a sale of the fund's units is a secondary transfer under the regulations and a sale of the parcel is a disposition with the charge.

The Qatari usufruct and the grantor

A Qatari parcel in one of the sixteen usufruct areas is held on a ninety-nine-year right granted by the State or a state body, and the grantor is a party to the category for the life of the holding. The grantor's consent is required for an assignment of the usufruct, which is the exit; the grantor's conditions on use, development and transfer are in the grant; and the grantor's own programme, where the area is inside a masterplan, is a second regime. A platform that reads the area list and not the grant has read half the category.

Where it surfaces

At the registry, when the contract is presented and the vehicle is not in the category.

At the seed list, when the parcel whose category cannot be satisfied was kept in the deck.

At the exit, when the buyer is outside the category and the registry will not record the sale.

At the category's conditions, when a registration lapses, a licence's activities clause is amended or a percentage is exceeded.

At the amendment of a state's regime, when a category the chain relies on is withdrawn or a new one the chain should use is introduced.

The cost of getting it wrong

A contract the registry will not record costs the deposit, the seller and the time; a seed that leaves the deck after the register subscribed costs the register's confidence; an exit to a buyer outside the category costs the sale; a category's conditions unmaintained cost the holding's recognition. Counsel in the state, reading the instrument and the registry's practice before the contract, costs a week and a modest sum. The structure paper carries the comparison, and a manager who has read it reads the state before the fund.

What each category costs to maintain

A category is a status with conditions, and the conditions are maintained for the life of the holding. The Kingdom's registration under 1446H is kept current for the activities actually carried on; the 2025 law's percentages and durations are observed; the registry's record is updated on every change. Qatar's company under the 2019 law keeps its approval's conditions; a usufruct's term runs. Kuwait's licensed scheme keeps its licence, its activities clause and its manager's standing; a company above the forty-nine per cent limit keeps its 2013 licence's conditions. India's company stays within construction-development and outside real estate business, files its foreign-investment reports and keeps the tranche register for the lock-in. Each is a line in the structure paper with a party and a calendar, and a category that lapses is a holder the registry may no longer recognise.

By state · by category	Who may hold land	The instrument	The holder a platform uses	The exit's category
The Kingdom	Non-Saudi persons, companies, Saudi companies with non-Saudi shareholders, SPVs and funds with non-Saudi holders, within areas and percentages	M/14 of 1447H and the scope document; 1446H registration	A Saudi vehicle in the categories, or a private real estate fund	A registered foreign buyer or a Saudi one; the disposition charge
Qatar	A non-Qatari in the twenty-five areas, nine freehold and sixteen usufruct	The area list; the 2019 law; the 2002 funds law	A company in a named area under a Centre fund	A permitted holder in the area; the grantor's consent to assign a usufruct
Kuwait	Listed companies with non-Kuwaiti partners; licensed real estate funds and portfolios with dealing among their activities; not private housing land	Law 74 of 1979; Decree 195 of 2025; Companies Law 2016; Law 116 of 2013	A licensed scheme with the activities clause	A permitted holder of the scheme's units or of the land
India	A foreign-owned Indian company for construction-development; not agricultural land	The foreign-investment rules on construction-development; the pricing rules	A construction-development company with the tranche register	A resident buyer at or below certified value; a non-resident buyer by negotiation

A timeline, as a type

Month one: the seed parcels are listed by state; counsel in each state is instructed to read the category for a vehicle of the fund's kind, asset class by asset class, and to confirm the registry's practice. Month two: the readings arrive; one parcel leaves the seed; the holders are designed. Month three: the exposure statement names the markets and the holders; the holders are formed with their categories' conditions on a calendar. Month four: the contracts, drafted to be recordable, are signed and recorded. Year two: the Kingdom's scope document is amended; the calendar catches it; the Saudi holder's percentage is confirmed within the new limits. Year four: Kuwait's decree is read for a second parcel; the licensed scheme's activities clause already covers it. Year six: the exit test is re-run; each state's permitted buyers are confirmed; the sale in each state completes at the registry.

The structure paper's page

The structure paper carries a category page: each state, the instrument, the category the holder uses, counsel's confirmation of the registry's practice, the category's conditions and their calendar, the permitted buyers at exit and the charge on disposition. The page is the first page of the onshore reading, and it is what the lender, the buyer and the registry are each answered from. It is prepared before the exposure statement, because the statement names the markets the page permits.

Reading the category with the lender

The lender reads the category for what it can take at the holder. Security over a Saudi vehicle's shares and over the parcel is perfected in the Kingdom's registries and enforced there; a lender to a Saudi private real estate fund takes what the fund regulations permit a fund to grant. Security over a Qatari company's shares and the usufruct is perfected in the State's registries, with the grantor's consent to any charge over the usufruct read from the grant. Security over a Kuwaiti licensed scheme's parcel is a question for Kuwaiti counsel on the day, with the mortgage law pending. Security over an Indian company's shares is read against the sectoral caps on who may own them. The category decides the lender's package before the lender is in the room.

A platform, as a type

A manager designs a logistics platform with parcels in three Gulf states. Before the exposure statement is final, it designs one holder per state: a Saudi vehicle with non-Saudi holders within the scope document's areas for the Riyadh parcel, confirmed with Saudi counsel against the registry's practice; a Qatari company in a named freehold area under the 2019 law for the Doha parcel, held by a Centre professional investor fund; and a Kuwaiti licensed scheme with dealing in real estate among its activities for the Kuwait City parcel, with the platform as unitholder. A fourth parcel in a Qatari area outside the list cannot be held by any vehicle the manager can form, and it leaves the seed. The exposure statement names the three markets and the three holders; the registries record each; the exit test reads each state's permitted buyers and the Kingdom's disposition charge; and the buyer at exit reads three categories maintained for six years.

Four cases, as types

A fund contracts to hold a parcel in an area of the Kingdom through a centre company, on the strength of the 2025 law's opening to non-Saudi companies. The company is not within the law's permitted percentage in that area, and the registry declines to record; the fund holds a contract, a deposit it cannot recover and a seller who has sold elsewhere.

A fund holds Qatari land in one of the nine freehold areas through a permitted holder and assumes the same holder may take a parcel in an area outside the list. It may not, and the second parcel is a conversation; the option the fund took over it is an option over land a non-Qatari cannot hold, and the option price is lost.

A fund forms a Kuwaiti company sixty per cent foreign-owned under a 2013 licence to hold a logistics parcel. The company is a non-Kuwaiti owner for the 1979 law's purpose to the extent of its foreign ownership; the decree's two holders do not include it; the registry declines, and the licensed scheme that should have been the holder is formed after the seller has lost patience.

A fund designs one holder per state before its exposure statement is final, with counsel in each state confirming the registry's practice, removes the parcel whose category cannot be satisfied, and maintains each category's conditions on a calendar. The statement names the markets and the holders; the registries record each; the exit test names each state's buyers.

What each party holds

The manager holds the design of one holder per state, the decision to remove an asset whose category cannot be satisfied, and the calendar of each category's conditions.

Counsel in each state holds the reading of the instrument and the registry's practice, before the contract.

The registry holds the category and the record, which is the ownership.

The lender reads the category for the security it can take at the holder.

The tax adviser reads the category for the disposition charge and the treaty position of the chain above.

The buyer at exit holds its own category, which the exit test named.

The sequence

1. Each state's ownership regime is read for the category a vehicle of the fund's kind falls into, asset class by asset class, by counsel in the state.
2. One holder per state is designed to that category, with the registry's practice confirmed.
3. Any asset whose category cannot be satisfied leaves the seed list before the exposure statement is final.
4. The category is read for the exit as well as the entry: the state's permitted buyers and what the registry will record.
5. Each category's conditions are maintained on a calendar with a named party.
6. The table is re-read when any state amends its regime.

Questions a manager asks

Does a centre fund's licence help onshore. It is evidence in the intermediary's diligence and in the registry's file that the vehicle is what it says; it is not a category under any state's ownership law.

Can one vehicle hold in two states. Only where both states' categories admit the same kind of person, which for real estate in the Gulf they do not; the design is one holder per state.

What if the state's regime changes after the holding is acquired. The category is re-read; a category no longer required is collapsed; a category newly required is formed before the registry asks.

Is the Saudi private real estate fund better than a Saudi vehicle. It is the permitted holder with a Saudi-licensed manager and the fund regulations' own duties; the vehicle is simpler where the category permits it. The choice is read against the areas, the register and the exit.

Who confirms the registry's practice. Counsel in the state who has recorded a transfer in that registry for that category, because practice is what the registrar does and not what the law says.

Does the category reach the exit. Always. The buyer's category and the registry's recording of the transfer are the exit, and a buyer outside the category is a sale that does not complete.

Terms used

Holder category: the kind of person a state's ownership law permits to hold an asset, on its conditions.

Scope document: the Kingdom's instrument fixing the areas, percentages and usufruct durations under the 2025 law.

Area list: Qatar's instrument naming the twenty-five areas of non-Qatari ownership.

Licensed scheme: Kuwait's collective investment scheme licensed with dealing in real estate among its activities.

Construction-development: India's permitted category for foreign capital in land, as opposed to real estate business.

Registry's practice: what the registrar in fact requires and records, read by counsel in the state.

What to read

Royal Decree M/14 of 1447H, its scope document and the Real Estate General Authority's guidance; the Investment Law of 1446H; Qatar's area list, the 2019 foreign investment law and Law No. 25 of 2002; Kuwait's Law 74 of 1979, Decree 195 of 2025, the Companies Law of 2016 and Law 116 of 2013; India's foreign-investment rules on construction-development and the pricing rules. On this site, the onshore interfaces door, the holding rooms for each state, and the India family.