Report: Malaysia lacks affordable housing

There is a shortage of affordable housing in Malaysia with only a quarter of houses launched nationwide from 2016 to March last year priced under RM250,000, a news portal reported today.

According to Singapore’s Straits Times, as of 2016, there were 7.5 million households against fewer than 5.8 million available homes.

In Kuala Lumpur, the average home price stands at RM773,000 while in Selangor, it hit RM497,000 by the third quarter of 2018. These prices, according to the report, is over 100 percent and 80 percent higher respectively than a decade ago.

Most developers, it noted, had taken the nation's housing shortage as a signal to raise prices.

Rise and fall of property prices

The Financial Stability Review by Bank Negara for the first half of last year reported that "the mismatch between housing demand and supply" is exerting "upward pressure on house prices”.

The increase in prices had then led to hundreds of thousands unsold units, including uncompleted projects.

As of end June last year, there were 146,196 unsold units, including uncompleted units that have been launched, with 80 percent of these priced above RM250,000.

However, according to an expert, this will now result in a drop in property prices.

"We expect residential property prices to decline slightly by one to three percent in 2019,” RHB property analyst Loong Kok Wen was quoted as saying.

In January, the Pakatan Harapan government launched its National Housing Policy, in hopes of addressing the housing issue. 

It held a housing expo last week in which 180 developers offered some 22,000 housing units priced at RM300,000 or less. Developers were asked to offer at least a 10 percent discount, and in return, get an exemption of stamp duties for the homes.

The government also promised to build 100,000 units of affordable homes capped at RM300,000 each every year.