Images: Dubai's skyscraper in motion

The Dubai tower is being presented as a luxury residence, and one order of business last week was to open up the reservation list for prospective buyers of the building's "villas." Those who would hope to be residents should check the depths of their pockets: Fisher says the buy-in price will start at about $3,000 per square foot, a princely sum, he acknowledges, even by Dubai's robust economic standards. That price would put the largest of the villas, measuring just under 12,900 square feet, at just under $39 million, while the smallest of the apartments, at a more modest 1,330 square feet, would cost close to $4 million.