Israel’s land agency had a strange Monday. In one afternoon, with no announcement, the Israel Land Authority postponed 14 housing tenders holding 1,783 planned homes, pushing them about three and a half months into the winter. The biggest is the 741-home HaKirya tender in central Tel Aviv. The same day it opened bidding on 18 other tenders with 4,390 homes, and tomorrow, August 5, bids close on 7,415 homes, the largest single closing day of the summer. Off the land desk: Chaim Katzman cancelled the NIS 661 million sale of control in G City one month after signing. The Lahav 433 fraud unit arrested a contractor who has been in bankruptcy for over a decade, on suspicion of hiding property rights worth tens of millions of shekels. Ramat Gan published a tender for a 400-unit senior living tower. Ramla won initial approval for 1,700 homes plus roughly 600,000 square meters of offices on its old industrial zone. National planners approved a key Haifa light-rail station and the widening of the coastal rail line to four tracks. And the Steinmetz family is appealing a tax bill of more than NIS 4 million on a NIS 27 million villa sale.
The state quietly pushed 1,783 homes to winter
On Monday, in database updates stamped between 10:15 am and 6:08 pm, the Israel Land Authority rescheduled 14 land tenders. A tender is a public auction of state land: the state opens it, builders bid, and it closes on a set date. These 14 were listed as open for months, but none of them ever truly took bids. Their sale booklets were never published, and each tender’s own record still says it “has not yet opened for bids.” The site has covered this listed-but-never-opened pattern before, in Tenders for 3,091 Israeli Homes Never Opened for Bids. Monday was the day the authority formally admitted the delay for a different, mostly larger group of tenders. There was no press release. We pulled the numbers from the authority’s own tender database and recomputed them ourselves.
| Tender | Where | Homes | Old opening | New opening | New closing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 450/2025 | Tel Aviv, HaKirya compound | 741 | Jun 15 | Oct 19 | Nov 23 |
| 372/2023 | Ilut | 276 | Jun 29 | Oct 12 | Nov 30 |
| 137/2026 | Ashdod, court compound (mixed use) | 234 | Jul 14 | Oct 5 | Dec 7 |
| 44/2026 | Tel Aviv | 180 | Jun 23 | Aug 17 | Oct 26 |
| 466/2024 | Jerusalem, Pierre Koenig | 115 | Jun 15 | Oct 19 | Nov 23 |
| 333/2023 | Shibli-Umm al-Ghanam | 102 | Jun 22 | Oct 12 | Nov 30 |
| 492/2025 | Ashkelon, Pardes Amitzur | 72 | Jul 8 | Sep 16 | Nov 16 |
| 7 smaller tenders | Peki’in, Rumat Heib, Tzelafon, Sgula, Ashkelon, Ra’anana, Kiryat Gat | 63 | Jun-Jul | Sep-Oct | Nov-Dec |
Our own figure: weighting each tender by its homes, the average opening was pushed back 107 days, with single delays running from 55 to 126 days. Basis: the opening date of each of the 14 tenders in the authority’s database on August 3 versus August 4.
Three more tenders, 336 homes between them, kept their open status but had their closing dates quietly pushed 11 to 12 weeks: a 288-home expansion tender in Maghar, 48 homes in Kisra-Sumei, and a commercial lot in Haifa’s Ispro area. The same afternoon, the authority opened bidding on 18 tenders with 4,390 homes, led by Efrat’s Givat HaZayit (694), Kiryat Ata (599 plus 200), Umm al-Fahm (523 plus 166), Ramat Gan (500), Mevaseret Zion (500), Azor (328), and 300 each in Pardesiya and Beit Shemesh’s Neve Shamir. On Tuesday morning it opened a 400-home tender in Ramat HaSharon, closing October 5.
Our own figure: counting the 1,783 postponed homes and the 336 with extended closings, 2,119 homes were delayed in one day against 4,390 opened. That means for every ten homes the state opened for bids on Monday, it delayed almost five. Basis: the same database snapshots.
Tomorrow, August 5, is the biggest closing day of the summer: 13 housing tenders with 7,415 homes stop taking bids, led by Sderot’s 2,868-home mega tender, two Ofakim tenders with 1,546 homes together, Tzfat (768 across two tenders), Nof HaGalil (562), Ma’alot-Tarshiha (436), Arad (370), and Mitzpe Ramon (366). Our own figure: the single Sderot tender is 38.7 percent of everything closing tomorrow. Basis: closing dates and unit counts in the August 4 database snapshot. Almost all of tomorrow’s homes sit in the south and north, the push covered in Israel Floods the South With Land for 17,500 Homes.
Why it matters: if you are waiting for a specific project in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Ashdod, or Ashkelon, the land under it just moved three months further away. Land that is not sold in 2026 becomes homes that are not started in 2027. Source: Israel Land Authority tender database, checked August 4.
The NIS 661 million G City handshake is off
Chaim Katzman has cancelled the sale of control of G City, the Tel Aviv listed company that owns shopping centers and income property, one month after signing. Tzachi Abu’s Ari Nadlan group had agreed to buy 26 percent of G City for NIS 661 million, with another 7 percent to follow. According to Calcalist, August 4, Katzman told Abu on Monday evening the deal was dead, and the NIS 20 million deposit will be returned. Globes, August 4 reports the relationship broke after Abu brought additional partners into the deal. Per Calcalist, the last straw was Abu’s agreement with Ishpro, built around a fast grab of control. The fight lands in a weak tape: Tel Aviv’s construction index fell 2.7 percent on Monday as August trading opened, per Calcalist, August 3.
Why it matters: for investors who hold Israeli property shares or bonds, control fights like this move prices fast, in both directions. A cancelled control sale usually means more uncertainty, not less.
Police arrest a bankrupt builder over hidden property rights
Israel’s national fraud unit, Lahav 433, on Monday morning detained a contractor who has been in bankruptcy proceedings for more than a decade, along with several businesspeople, including a senior figure in Likud party institutions. The suspicion: hiding real-estate rights and smuggling assets worth tens of millions of shekels away from creditors. The arrests were reported by TheMarker, August 3, Calcalist, August 3, and ice, August 3. No charges have been filed.
Why it matters: a builder’s hidden money trouble becomes the buyer’s problem at delivery time. Before you sign with any developer, run the checks in the site’s Israel Real Estate Due Diligence Guide.
Ramat Gan wants 400 senior homes in one 35-story tower
Ramat Gan’s municipality published a tender on Sunday to build a 400-unit assisted living tower, 35 stories tall, on city land in the center of town. Diur mugan is Israel’s assisted living model: seniors pay a large refundable deposit instead of buying the apartment. The tower would replace two aging senior residences. The tender was reported Monday by Merkaz HaNadlan, August 3, Ynet, August 3, and Calcalist, August 3.
Why it matters: supply of senior housing in the center is tight and deposits keep climbing. One 400-unit tower in central Ramat Gan is real new supply for English-speaking retirees who want city life near family. For what these places cost today, see Diur Mugan in Israel: Definition, Costs, and Price Comparison.
Ramla trades its old factory zone for 1,700 homes
The Central District Planning Committee approved the “Sha’ar Tzafon” plan for deposit on Monday. Deposit is the stage where a plan is published so the public can file objections before final approval. The plan converts Ramla’s old northern industrial zone into a mixed district: about 1,700 homes plus office and employment space that reports put between 588,000 and 600,000 square meters, next to a planned metro station. Reported by Ynet, August 3 and Merkaz HaNadlan, August 3.
Our own figure: using the 600,000 figure, that is about 350 square meters of workspace planned for every new home, a jobs-first plan rather than a bedroom suburb. Basis: 600,000 divided by 1,700.
Why it matters: Ramla is one of the last cheap central cities. A metro-adjacent district with that much employment changes what nearby apartments are worth, years before anything is built. Objections come first, so the timeline is long.
Two rail approvals in one day around Haifa
The National Infrastructure Committee approved two transit plans on Monday that matter for anyone buying in the north.
First, it approved the Dayan station of the Nofit light rail, next to the Merkazit HaMifratz transit hub. Nofit is Israel’s first regional light rail: about 41 kilometers and 20 stations linking Haifa, the Krayot, Shfar’am, Nof HaGalil, and Nazareth. The approval moves one of the line’s key stations to the construction stage, per Colbo, August 3 and ice, August 3.
Second, it cleared the Transport Ministry to start work on widening the coastal railway to four tracks along roughly 68 kilometers between Haifa’s Hof HaCarmel and Shefayim: two tracks for intercity trains at up to 250 km/h and two for suburban service, with four more suburban tracks between Netanya and Shefayim, per Colbo, August 3.
Why it matters: rail decisions reprice neighborhoods long before trains run. If you are choosing between Haifa-area suburbs, station maps now beat sea views. The site’s light rail guide explains how to read them.
A NIS 27 million villa sale, taxed like a company
Beny Steinmetz and his family are appealing a decision by the Netanya land taxation office that charged them more than NIS 4 million in mas shevach on the sale of a villa in Arsuf for NIS 27 million. Mas shevach is Israel’s capital gains tax on property, the tax on the profit from a sale. The family argues the office wrongly applied the corporate tax rate to the sale. Reported by Globes, August 3 and Calcalist, August 3.
Why it matters: how you hold a property, personally or through a company, can change your exit tax by millions. The rules for regular sellers are in Mas Shevach When Selling Property in Israel.
For the site’s editors: three updates, no new pages
These stories belong to pages the site already owns. Update the page, do not write a new one.
- Record Share of Israeli Mortgages Went Upmarket (ID 84375): add the June data point: Israelis took NIS 1.8 billion in mortgages for homes above NIS 5 million, up about 50 percent from a year earlier and the highest month since the Bank of Israel series began in June 2016, while the number of investor loans fell about 20 percent (TheMarker, August 4; ice, August 4).
- Tel Aviv’s Toxic Plots Now Have Builder Names (ID 84393): add one line: the first Sde Dov buyer has gone to court to cancel an apartment option deal (7 percent already paid) over the soil contamination (Ynet, August 3).
- Yokneam Cements Status as Northern Tech Capital (ID 59866): correct the hotel line: the “first-ever hotel” is dead. Li Marshall dropped the NIS 120 million plan over the nearby Elbit plant and is left with about NIS 50 million in debts (ice, August 3; Calcalist Tech, August 3).
Checked today and not shipped
- Dira BeHanacha win notices for 7,922 homes, and a Globes story on a Harish buyer ranked 3,393 for 115 homes: the lottery is already covered (ID 84599, housing-lottery-results-leak-ministry-not-real, and earlier lottery pages).
- Globes on the rate cut not reaching mortgage borrowers: the site already owns this exact angle (ID 84169, israel-cut-rates-again-but-mortgages-barely-feel-it).
- Weizmann Institute’s 805 student homes (Ynet re-run): event was August 2, covered in yesterday’s brief.
- Jerusalem Kukia compound court approval (magdilim re-run): covered by ID 84619, jerusalems-new-towers-just-won-twice-in-court.
- A BYNDbiz analysis of 111,000 resale deals claiming no-mamad homes rose faster (Globes): one source only, dropped under the two-source rule.
- A court ruling that a seller who backed out on signing morning owes no NIS 620,000 penalty (psakdin): ruling date could not be verified, single source.
- TheMarker items on a NIS 500,000 costs ruling in a TAMA 38 parking fight and on a Beit Shemesh Neve Shamir green-space petition: single source, paywalled.
- Developer-selection items (Kiryat Motzkin 280 homes, Rishon LeZion 81, Jerusalem Baka 280, Kiryat Yam 400): single source or PR.
- The record-emigration study (90,922 Israelis left in 2025): not a property story.
- Housing-protest Facebook page posts relayed by NewsNow: relays, not data.
Sources
Israel Land Authority tender database · Calcalist (G City) · Globes (G City) · Calcalist (TASE open) · TheMarker (Lahav 433) · Calcalist (Lahav 433) · ice (Lahav 433) · Merkaz HaNadlan (Ramat Gan tower) · Ynet (Ramat Gan tower) · Calcalist (Ramat Gan tower) · Ynet (Ramla) · Merkaz HaNadlan (Ramla) · Colbo (Dayan station) · ice (Nofit) · Colbo (coastal four-tracking) · Globes (Steinmetz) · Calcalist (Steinmetz) · TheMarker (luxury mortgages) · ice (luxury mortgages) · Ynet (Sde Dov suit) · ice (Yokneam hotel) · Calcalist Tech (Yokneam hotel)
