Ronnie

Well, it actually goes further back than 2012.

I started visiting Dubai as a holiday destination with my family in 1998, believe it or not.

I immediately fell in love with the place, went there two or three times a year, really enjoyed the experience.

My kids

We pretty much grew up in the marina, albeit that we were tourists as opposed to residents.

We always stayed in the same hotel, always had brilliant experiences with the levels of service and overall experience for the family's safe environment, five-star luxury.

It was absolutely fabulous.

And then I decided in 2010 with my family that what we decide to do is move out, lock, stock and barrel, move out to Dubai and set up a property company.

I've always been involved in property, both in London and further afield.

I decided to set up in a new continent, in a city that I'd never worked in before in real terms, but we took our heart in our hands and decided to open up and never look back.

It was a fabulous journey.

Yeah, from a expat perspective, there was a mass exodus over the last, what, two years from London moving to Dubai for all of the reasons that most people do, and that is tax efficiency, quality, lifestyle, and safety, and a great educational environment if you are going out there with a family.

So expats now that I've spoken to in London, I've spoken to a few who have just moved back.

They are literally watching to see how things develop.

As a family man, you have an absolute determination to look after your children, your wife, your husband, and make sure that they are as safe as possible.

The feeling is the people that I've spoken to will look at this situation as it unfolds within the region and then make a call on whether they're going to either go back to Dubai when it's become prudent to do so or take another avenue, either come back to London or the UK or move to another destination.

I've yet to have that shared with me as an option because I think it's too early to say and a lot of people are taking that stance.

I think if you look at it from a pragmatic point of view, obviously, as Mario said earlier, this is the first time that Dubai has been broiled in any situation that has unfolded in the Middle East.

It's a safe haven and money gravitates, people gravitate towards Dubai as being the Switzerland of the Middle East, being a neutral destination, if you will, politically as well as geographically.

It's a wonderfully located city.