When Dan McDougall of Atlanta tells people he has bought property in Morocco - in a place called Saidia that he had never heard of before the purchase - they say he has gone one step too far with his real estate investments.

But when he tells them he has bought two apartments overlooking a golf course and the Mediterranean in one of Morocco's most prestigious new resorts, they are soon asking how they can get involved, too.

Four years ago, very few people outside of Morocco had heard of Saidia - or even of the Oriental region along the Algerian border, where it is situated. Being on the eastern-most edge of Morocco, with no highways connecting it to the rest of the country, the region has been a backwater, even though it has one of the country's most attractive coastlines.

Then, everything changed in 2002 when King Mohammed VI announced that Saidia would be the site of his flagship resort, Mediterrania-Saidia, the first of six luxury coastal developments in Morocco. The other five are being built along the country's Atlantic coast.

With a government investment of $4.4 billion in what is called the Plan Azur developments, the six resorts are intended to regenerate some of the poorest regions and to contribute to the kingdom's tourism numbers. The overall goal is to triple the number of vacationers coming to Morocco to 10 million by 2010.

"It was the involvement of the king that got me interested," said McDougall, an education program director in the Atlanta school system. "Even though I do not know much about Morocco, I figured if the king is behind this development then it has got to succeed."

Mediterrania-Saidia, now in the second of a three-part building plan, will stretch six kilometers, or a little less than four miles, along the sandy coastline next to the Moulouya Estuary, home to more than 180 species of birds.

Scheduled to be completed in 2010, it will be the largest resort in North Africa, with three 18-hole golf courses, 10 four- to five-star hotels, a marina with 850 berths, a yacht club and 3,000 luxury apartments and villas built in both Andalusian and Morocco style.

It is not just the development that is expected to draw a minimum of 250,000 visitors a year initially, increasing to 500,000 by 2012. The area has hot, dry summers, tempered by southwest trade winds, and damp winters, which means that the region is rich in citrus trees, almonds, evergreens and vineyards. Also, the Beni Snassen, one of Morocco's most beautiful mountain ranges, lies close by.

The master developer of Mediterrania-Saidia is the Spanish developer Fadesa, which owns most of the site but has sold some plots to other developers. McDougall's property is in Les Jardins du Maroc, part of the Le Jardin de Fleur range of homes being developed by the Spanish-based developer Property Logic, which owns 11 plots of land in the resort.

"Though more expensive than the Fadesa apartments, these were more architecturally unique," McDougall said, adding that they also will have a lot of outdoor space. The properties will come fully furnished with luxury fittings, satellite television and integrated Siemens appliances in the kitchens.

"My initial intention was to sell both of the properties when they were built but now that I have got to know Morocco and seen the potential of the resort, I am going to hold on to them," said McDougall, who paid 1.6 million dirham, or $210,000, for each of the 110-square-meter, or 1,184-square-foot, apartments. Each also will have a 50-square-meter terrace.

"I have a large extended family and I really look forward to us all going over and if I keep both places, we might just fit," McDougall said. The 31-year-old already owns an apartment in Manhattan, land in Salt Lake City, an office block in northern Georgia and two acres of beachfront in the Dominican Republic. Of all those places, though, he says he is most excited about Morocco.

"I am really interested in the culture," he said. "In between renting out my apartment I hope to spend long spells of six months or so in Morocco getting to know the country."

Although Mediterrania-Saidia is attracting the most interest worldwide - both for the size and quality of the development - its location several hundred kilometers from Morocco's most famous cities, like Fez, Marrakech and Casablanca, has deterred many would-be buyers. Saidia's main transportation hub is the city of Oujda, 60 kilometers to the south, a modern university town made prosperous through agriculture and mining.

"The majority of our clients who buy here are doing so for the lifestyle that Saidia offers, not so much because they desperately want a property in Morocco," said Tim Tolbert of the Essential Morocco real estate agency, based in Spain. "You certainly get a taste of the country, though, through the architecture, warm climate and mountainous landscape. There is a Moroccan souk on the resort, a 17th century castle in the town and a nearly 200-year-old casbah, or old fortress, which runs a market every Sunday."

Amelia Grisswood of Saffron Villas, a British-based real estate agency, said, "Around 50 percent of the properties at the resort have been sold to primarily Spanish, British and Irish buyers." And the figure is expected to increase when the third group of residences are released for sale over the next couple of months.

Improvements in access also will help with sales, agents say. There are new highways being built from Saidia to Tangier, 550 kilometers to the west, and from nearby Oujda to Fez, a total of 320 kilometers. While it is possible to fly from Paris, Marseilles, Brussels and Amsterdam to Oujda now, additional routes are expected to be added.

In addition to the Plan Azur developments, there is a surge of development all along Morocco's 3,500 kilometers of coastline, with a number of resorts scheduled to be completed by 2010. Just around Tangier, where the Atlantic and Mediterranean meet, there are more than 14 developments under construction. While few of them will be as large or luxurious as Mediterrania-Saidia or any of the other Plan Azur resorts, they will benefit from spectacular positions overlooking the Mediterranean and their close proximity to golf courses.

Richard Chapman from Leicester, England, bought an apartment at the recently built 180-apartment Mirador Golf, which is next to Cabo Negro, a seaside resort with an 18-hole golf club commissioned by the late King Hassan II. "I did consider buying an apartment in Saidia but the properties on Mirador Golf were more affordable and I like being close to Tangier and Tetouan, which have the best of both old and new Morocco," he said.

Chapman paid 500,000 dirham for his 65-square-meter unfurnished two-bedroom apartment, which he intends, like McDougall, to rent to vacationers. But unlike Mediterrania-Saidia, there is no rental management company at Mirador Golf, so Chapman will handle the rentals himself. Much of his plans are dependent on the European low-cost carriers opening routes to Tangier, which are expected but have not been announced. Until that happens, Europeans can use the 10-mile ferry hop from Algeciras in southern Spain to reach Tangier but, otherwise, the tourist market has been quiet.

While Chapman is about to receive the keys to his new apartment, McDougall still has some time to wait before he can stroll through the marble hallways of his Mediterranean bolthole.

"That I actually own somewhere in Morocco is only just starting to sink in," he said. "I am really pleased to have got in early. People over here are just beginning to notice Morocco as an unusual place to visit and I already own a tiny part of it. I guess I need to start planning some time off work."

--By Abby Aron

More info available on www.essentialmorocco.com, today's most informative website on purchasing investment and lifestyle property in Morocco.