Neom’s Trojena to launch first apartment sales in new year

Alamy via Reuters

• Inaugural Neom site
• Opening in 2027
• Targeting affluent Saudis

The Saudi winter resort of Trojena will begin putting its first residential apartments and villas on the market within a few months, a senior official said on Wednesday, after its parent company Neom announced a new CEO in an effort to reinvigorate the giga-project. 

“2025 is very exciting for us at Trojena, we’re hoping early in the New Year to bring Trojena’s first residential product to market. The ski village is our first intended product, then closely followed by the Slope Residence chalets,” Simon Howard, Trojena’s head of sales, told a real estate forum in Riyadh. 

“Everything from studio apartments to six-bedroom apartments in the ski village and chalets from 200 to 800 square metres… over 700 private apartments for sale, over 130 serviced apartments,” he said, adding that units would be released for sale in batches throughout the year.

“There will be something for everyone in that first release.” 

Trojena said earlier this year it aims to be the inaugural site of Neom – the jewel in the crown of Saudi Arabia’s $1.25 trillion giga-projects – completed and ready to open in 2027 ahead of the 2029 Asian Winter Games. 

On Tuesday, Neom said it had replaced its CEO Nadhmi Al-Nasr in an apparent effort to boost the kingdom’s highest-profile giga-project after a string of negative headlines over construction delays, worker mistreatment and senior foreign nationals being overpaid.

• Neom raises $24 billion from the private sector
• Neom signs Singapore’s GHM to manage new hotel in Trojena
• Giga-project slowdown to hit Riyadh population growth

Abdelrahman Tallawi, business development director at Muthalathat Real Estate development, said he expected significant interest in the Trojena units from affluent Saudis seeking second homes.  

“I anticipate a positive impact on the market. It’s one of the unique projects not only in Saudi Arabia but across the Middle East,” he said, citing a survey of 30,000 high-net-worth individuals that showed 73 percent wanted to invest in giga-project properties.

Neom, including Trojena, a linear city called The Line, an industrial city called Oxagon and a series of Gulf of Aqaba resorts for the super-rich called Magna, is valued at $500 billion, making it the leading Saudi giga-project. 

The giga-projects are facing funding pressures due to lower than expected global oil prices and foreign investment. The government is also funnelling more resources to Riyadh-based projects after the capital won hosting rights for the World Expo 2030. 

Still, a Neom official recently revealed that the mega-city – a territory the size of Belgium in Saudi Arabia’s northwest corner – is taking up one fifth of world steel production. Trojena is one reason for that, as work goes ahead on a massive lake and dam in the mountains. 

“We just signed one of the largest steel contracts  in the world, in March – 129,000 tons of steel to build the ski village. The first steel arrived in June,” head of marketing Clark Williams said.