For housing, the following was announced in Budget 2018 to ease home ownership in Malaysia:

1. The Government will continue to intensify efforts to increase home-ownership for the rakyat with an allocation of RM2.2 billion as follows:

• 17,300 units of People’s Housing Programme;econd: 3,000 units of People’s Friendly Home under SPNB;
• 210,000 units of houses under PR1MA with prices RM250,000 and below. For this, RM1.5 billion is allocation for the period of two years;
• 25,000 units of 1Malaysia Civil Servants Housing Programme (PPA1M) will be completed in 2018 while another 128,000 units are at various stages of construction;
• 600 units of MyBeautiful New Homes (MyBNHomes) scheme for B40 households in Terengganu, Pahang, Melaka, Johor, Sabah and Sarawak as well as Orang Asli settlements;
• 2,000 units under MyDeposit programme to assist down payments as well as MyHomes programme to enable developers to provide more affordable homes; and
•  A sum of RM200 million is allocated for maintenance and refurbishment of houses, including the 1Malaysia Maintenance Fund.

2. To encourage the construction of more affordable homes, the step-up financing scheme introduced by PR1MA will be extended to private housing developers subject to certain criteria.

3. With regard to abandoned housing projects, stamp duty exemption for loan agreements and letter of consent to transfer, are given to rescuing contractors and original owners of abandoned projects, effective 1 January 2018 to 31 December 2020.

4. To promote rental of residential homes, for the first time in 60 years, the Government proposes a 50% tax exemption on rental income received by resident individuals not exceeding RM2,000 per month for resident individuals.

5. This exemption is effective from the year of assessment of 2018 to 2020. The Government will also formulate the Residential Rental Act to protect the landlord and tenant.

Source: TheStar.com.my

Property developer Mah Sing Group Bhd will be launching its ‘Reinvent Affordability’ campaign tomorrow, which will serve as a key theme in the group’s business plan — to develop more affordably priced homes to cater to the market’s supply demand gap.

Its managing director Tan Sri Leong Hoy Kum said there is still a supply and demand gap in the property industry, with an average yearly increase of 118,000 households formed against a supply of 85,000 completed new houses yearly between 2012 and 2014.

“We believe that our business direction in developing more affordably priced homes does not only bridge the mismatch in supply and demand gap for the affordable segment but also ties in with the government’s broad Budget 2018 objectives in helping rakyat to own a home,” he said in a statement today.

The campaign covers the group’s four upcoming new launches, namely M Centura in Sentul — a freehold residential development, M Vertica in Cheras — a serviced residence, M Vista in Penang — a residential development, and Fern phase 2 in Meridin East, Johor — two-storey homes, where unit selections will begin from this weekend onwards.

Find out more about M Vista @ Southbay, Batu Maung

“All projects have recorded very high registration of interest and are expected to be well taken up once the projects are launched,” he said.

Leong said keeping the best interest of homeowners in mind, the group plans for its residential products to be affordable without compromising the quality and facilities to further enhance the life of homebuyers.

“We want our customers to be able to enjoy the best of both worlds by providing homes with superior product specifications at a price point many can actually afford,” he said.

Source: EdgeProp.my

Warning of a “homeless generation” of Malaysians who cannot afford to own homes, the National House Buyers Association (HBA) mooted four mechanisms to avert such a crisis, including curbing property speculation through higher stamp duty rates and higher real property gains tax on buyers and sellers who own more than two properties.

HBA said the government should increase the supply of affordable homes by incentivising private developers with fast-track project approvals, cheaper land conversion or alienation costs, partial tax exemption on profits from such projects.

It also mooted a nationwide rent-to-own scheme for the B40 and M40 group to help them overcome the usual 10 per cent deposit hurdle; it also urged the government to intervene by imposing price controls on affordable housing as it knew the actual land costs developers had to bear.

The Real Estate and Housing Developers Association (Rehda) proposed measures to make it easier for first-time buyers of affordable homes, including full stamp duty exemption on higher-value affordable properties instead of the RM300,000 limit announced in the last Budget, as well as exemption from higher conveyancing legal fee rates —— newly introduced this March —— for such properties.

Rehda’s detailed 10-point list also suggested waiving the Goods and Services Tax (GST) on affordable housing construction materials, and allowing first-time homebuyers earning below RM10,000 to have the housing loan interest during the construction period to be included in their affordable housing unit’s price.

Besides asking for lower business costs, Rehda also said the minimum RM1 million price limit announced in Budget 2014 for foreign buyers of residential properties should be replaced with a three-tier pricing system according to how urbanised a state is.

Source: The Malay Mail Online

Article by Freemind Works

Budget 2018 will be announced on 27 October. And next year’s budget will be an important one, as Malaysia’s 14th general election is around the corner, now widely expected to be held in the first quarter of next year. Many also believed that this budget is about creating a “feel-good” factor.

Discover how the budget 2018 will impact the property market, click here

Unlike previous years, however, analysts believe that for next year, Malaysia will be starting the year on better footing as the global economic conditions are improving.

How does this translate to us as a Rakyat?

As I did my own research on this, I discovered that on top of Malaysian’s wish list is simply:

Easier access to home ownership

In 2015, a report by Khazanah Research Insitute showed that residential properties prices in Kuala Lumpur and Penang were both ‘severely unaffordable’. And under 11MP (2016 to 2020), the government set the target of building 653,000 homes for the poor, low-income and middle-income households.

The Budget 2018 could see announcements of further initiatives for the government’s on-going affordable housing programme; PR1MA and PPA1M.

But, this is not a clear-cut solution. As at 16 August, 2017 only 8,475 units of out of the original 500,000 units of the affordable housing has been completed.

The other major concern for home ownership or investment is having your loan approved. More than 50% of loan application is rejected.

There is a suggestion to create a specialized bank for matters of housing financing with relevant mechanisms. This would aid Malaysians who wish to purchase a house but have trouble doing so (due to absences of documents and illegibility given by conventional banks).

This could also solve the problem of excessive properties which are unsold.

Increase allowances and income

Salaried people now worry about their take-home pay, as costs are rising much faster than wages. If you are single and living in KL, you need at least RM2,700 a month to survive. Many turn to a second job to earn an extra income.

More worryingly, a recent Bank Negara survey showed more than 75% of Malaysians find it difficult to even raise RM1,000 to meet emergency needs.

The same survey also showed that only 6% of salaried Malaysians can sustain themselves for more than six months if they lose their jobs, the main source of their income.

The middle-class (the so-called M40) is also not spared from the impact of higher living costs as their income remains stagnant. The income stagnation is one of the anxieties of the middle-class. While Malaysians enjoy a higher standard of living, their income has not growing as much as the costs.

For the medium income group earners, there is a possibility for the government to cut personal income tax rate in Budget 2018 as well as introduction of a new tax
exemptions.

My take is, why not take matters into your own hand and discover how you can create an additional RM20,000 to RM60,000 a year with property investment?

Find out more here >> Budget 2018 Talk

And good news for Penangites, we will be organising a one-day Budget 2018 talk to give you the highlights of the Budget 2018, details as below:

Date: Saturday, 28 October
Time: 9am – 6pm

And for the first 17 Penang Property Talk readers, you can come and listen to the Budget 2018 talk for FREE! Enter the coupon code “propertytalk” (case sensitive) when checking out to get your FREE seat.

As seats are limited, register your seat here now:

>> Budget 2018 Talk

– Kaygarn Tan

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Rescuers have unearthed three bodies at the construction site hit by a massive landslide in Tanjung Bungah here today.

Penang Fire and Rescue Department director Saadon Mokhtar said the search was ongoing for 11 more people believed to be still buried underneath the muddy soil.

“We found the first two bodies at 9.15am and 10.45am while we found the third one at about 1pm,” he told reporters at the site.

The three dead were among 14 construction workers including a local who were buried by the landslide.

He cautioned that efforts to locate the remaining victims would be slow and arduous as the slope is unsteady while soil conditions were muddy.

“We believe some of the victims are buried deep underneath the muddy soil, as deep as 35m below the surface,” he said.

“We are also getting the canine unit to assist in the search and rescue operations,” he added.

The workers had been working on the underground portion of the site when the landslide occurred, he said.

Saadon added that his department has detected other unsafe areas in the vicinity and ordered for all construction work to be stopped immediately.

In the 8.50am incident, about 20 construction workers were working at the site of the affordable housing project when the soil on the adjacent hill slope next suddenly collapsed.

A total 14 workers failed to escape and were buried by the mud and soil.

Search and rescue operations are still underway and the local authorities have also issued a stop-work order against the project.

The construction is for the Granito@Permai affordable housing project at Jalan Lembah Permai.

The development consists of a 49-storey building with two towers and 12 levels of car parks. It has 980 units for sale at below RM400,000 and was listed as an affordable housing project.

Source: The Malay Mail Online

Landslide location