I would definately recommend a visit to El Gouna next time you are in hurghada area. what i like about gouna is that because its controlled by one man (who is not really in it for the money anymore as he has enough already) you have the feeling there is a coordinated overall masterplan for the place and a Chairman who is chief quality control officer as he is there a lot with his friends who he wants to be happy and many of whom have houses there. when ive been down to sahl or sharm there are lots of plots being developoed by different groups, some of which are very good and some of which arnt- and you therefore get the impression that its not very well planned overall and buyers can be dissapointed as new developments come on stream that are either not very pretty or overlook or block their views. Im sure the Damac scheme will be well masterplanned but that will probably be 7-10 years living in a building site at best and at least with Gouna all the major risks are over in terms of infrastructure.
One thing I was very impressed with when i bought my villa 2 years ago was that at the time there was no plan to extend the lagoon up to my house and instead it was more like a stream. In the end the Chairman himself intervened and at huge expense to Orascom (and no cost to us owners in phase 5) he widened the lagoon greatly which cost a lot and was not an obligation of theirs at all. Now I have put in a boat Jetty ! I think he felt he didnt want people complaining or seeing villas that were below the usual high standards for Gouna even though this portion of lagoon only served about 15 villas.
I think an owners involvement is a really good thing with a place like Gouna. I know all the leading resorts like Sotogrande and Val de Lobo had v strong individuals who were the backbone of the whole thing and really got involved. I also heard a funny story the other day about an incident at Gouna where someone very senior was cut up on the road by a rogue local tuk tuk driver and he was dismissed on the spot. I like the fact that its not a democracy - provided the owner has the right instincts ! Although Im sure many PC people would disagree with me !
Yours
jeremy
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Originally Posted by queenie40something
Hi Crombie - welcome home.
It is certainly sounding great. El Gouna is one place that we have not visited and I am starting to regret not going for a day visit when we where in Hurghada - we may have preferred it to Sharm. Too late now though but maybe we could swap apartments sometime to have a change!!
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