AYLA Property and the honest broker problem in Bali

Every few years a place becomes the answer to a question people have been asking themselves on the commute home. For a while it was Spain, then Dubai. Now, for a certain kind of British and European buyer, it is Bali: rice fields giving way to surf breaks, villas with plunge pools, and rental listings that promise the place will pay for itself while you are not there. It is a lovely story. Like most lovely stories about money, it hides a plot twist or two.

AYLA Property exists for the plot twists. It is an agency based in Pererenan, on Bali’s south-west coast, that helps overseas buyers find, check and negotiate on villas, and it calls itself “totally agnostic” about which developer you buy from. I am involved in it, as the box above makes clear, so take my verdict as a partisan’s: the method is sound and the honesty is real, but the most important thing it can teach you is to distrust headline yields, including its own.

How it works

The process runs in three acts. A consultation to understand what you want, from budget to whether this is a holiday home or a pure investment. Curation, where AYLA cuts the market down to a shortlist. Then research and negotiation, which is where the money is made or lost. AYLA says the whole thing typically takes four to eight weeks from first call to signed agreement.

It is free to buyers. AYLA is paid a commission by the developer you buy from. That is the standard model, and it creates the obvious tension: an agent paid by sellers has to work hard to prove it is on the buyer’s side. AYLA’s answer is to have no favourite developer and to publish its homework, which brings us to the best thing it has made.

The report

The Bali Developer Report 2026 covers 511 listings from 80 developers across 15 areas, collected between January 2025 and May 2026. The median price is $290,000, and the median projected return across those listings is 10.6% a year. Area guides cover Canggu, Uluwatu, Pererenan, Seseh, Kedungu and Sanur, and there is an ROI calculator and a “Can I buy in Bali?” checker for the legal questions most buyers do not know to ask.

Those legal questions matter more than the view. Foreigners cannot hold freehold land in Indonesia. Most overseas buyers take a long leasehold, or buy through a foreign-owned Indonesian company, known as a PT PMA. AYLA itself is one of those companies. Get this part wrong and the pool, the rice field and the sunset are all standing on someone else’s land.

There is personality here too. The team page lists Silvia as president, me as vice president, Willy as the agent, and Jackie, the team mascot, whose professional background apparently includes foraging for rodents. Property is a serious business. It is no bad thing when the people in it do not take themselves too seriously.

Where it falls short

Now the twist I promised. AYLA’s homepage headline talks about 15%-plus returns. Its own FAQ says net returns are more like 8 to 14%, and its report’s median projection is 10.6%. The FAQ is the number to believe, and even that depends on occupancy, management fees, maintenance in a tropical climate, tourism holding up and the rupiah not falling against your home currency. A projected yield is a developer’s forecast, not a bank statement. The site should lead with the honest number, because the honest number is what makes AYLA different.

The company is also young, formed in 2025, and many of the boldest claims about the market (that its data exists nowhere else, that its shortlist beats most agencies) are judgements you cannot check. The report itself you can. Read it before you read anything else.

Here is the verdict, then. If Bali is calling, go in with someone whose method you can see, and with the cynicism of a person who has read the small print. AYLA offers the first. This article, I hope, supplies the second.

This article is for general information and is not medical, legal or financial advice. Laws differ between countries. Read our editorial standards.