Soneva for owners: thirty years of barefoot luxury, fifteen of villa sales

Soneva is the name most repeat visitors to the Maldives associate with the idea of owning a home on a resort island. It opened Soneva Fushi in the Baa Atoll in 1995, began selling villas to foreign buyers there in 2011, and has offered homes at Soneva Jani in the Noonu Atoll since that resort opened in 2016. Since May 2025 it has been controlled by KSL Capital Partners.

Who they are

Soneva was founded by Sonu Shivdasani and Eva Malmström Shivdasani. The couple also created Six Senses, whose brands they sold in 2012 to concentrate on Soneva. Today the company runs three Maldivian resorts, Soneva Fushi, Soneva Jani and Soneva Secret (announced in October 2023 on a remote island in the north-west), together with the Soneva in Aqua yacht.

In May 2025 KSL Capital Partners, a private equity firm focused on travel and leisure that had first invested in Soneva in 2019, took a majority stake and appointed Neil Gallagher as chief executive. The founders have since stepped back from the business.

How they build and run

Soneva's approach has been consistent for three decades. Villas are large, low and made of natural materials: bamboo and plantation timber rather than rainforest hardwood, reclaimed wood and metal where possible, furniture made largely in the resorts' own workshops. The style is informal (no shoes, bicycles, open-air bathrooms) but the service is intensive, with a personal butler for each villa.

Sustainability is part of the operation rather than a brochure page. In February 2025 the trade press reported that solar and battery systems installed at Fushi and Jani were supplying about half of both resorts' electricity, with a floating solar project planned at Soneva Secret. In August 2026 Soneva announced that part of Medhufaru, the island at Soneva Jani, had been recognised as a conservation area under the OECM framework, a first for a Maldivian resort.

What the name means for an owner

Three things, mainly.

A track record. Soneva has sold, delivered and managed resort homes in the Maldives for fifteen years, longer than anyone else. Owners can speak to other owners, look at villas that have been lived in and rented for a decade, and see how the resort has maintained them.

A resort that already exists. Both ownership islands are open and trading. An owner is buying into a finished place with a known standard of service, not a render.

A brand tied to one operator. A Soneva villa's value rests on the Soneva experience: its service, its rental demand and its reputation. That is a strength while the brand is strong, and a concentration of risk if it changes. The 2025 change of control makes it worth asking how the new owners see the villa-ownership programme, how owners' contracts would be affected by any future sale of the resort, and whether sales are currently open. When we checked in September 2026 the ownership pages that Soneva had published for years were no longer on its website.

For a buyer who already knows and loves one of the islands, Soneva remains the most established route to a home there. The due diligence is the same as for any resort residence: the head lease, the title, the contracts and the rental record. Our five-part series on Soneva Villa Ownership covers each in turn.