State may tighten rules for foreign property buyers
The Penang government may revise present guidelines for foreigners buying property in the state in view of the declining value of the ringgit.
State Housing, Town and Country Planning Committee chairman Jagdeep Singh Deo said he would meet with stakeholders next week to discuss the guidelines which restrict foreigners from buying landed homes of not more than RM2mil on the island and RM1mil on the mainland.
“We’re concerned about the spiralling property prices which have been compounded by foreigners snapping up homes due to a weaker ringgit,” he said after closing the Property and Investment Expo at Sunway Carnival Convention Centre in Seberang Jaya yesterday.
Jagdeep said there had been a steady increase of foreigners buying property in Penang since 2012.
“If the value of ringgit declines further, the property market will get extremely hot,” he said.
“While we believe in the free market and encourage foreigners to buy property here, it must not be at the expense of the locals who will not be able to buy property in their home state if the prices continue to increase,” he added.
Jagdeep said the rise in property prices affected mainly the high-end units as the government was controlling the prices of the low-cost and low medium-cost units to enable the locals to buy them.
Source: TheStar.com.my
Well, at least the state has finally realized that 5% (or some say 3%) of foreign buying has a huge impact to the price psychology. It affects what type of properties developers build, as well as their price strategy.
Truth is, if foreigners were to apply via MM2H program they get to buy a condo from rm500k onwards. Fair enough since they plan on retiring here.
come on lah, only 226 units sold to foreigners in year 2014, why wanna make a big fuss.
its not like penang people got no house.
@Penang
wow, from the other article, it seems that foreign buying in Penang averaged 9% of total number of transactions from year 2010 to 2012. Assuming that average maintains itself in 2014, that means we have 7% of total transactions which were by foreigners who are not MM2H, which 2% were by MM2H. So if 226 is 2%, then 7% means almost 800 units. So in total, you have about 1000 units sold to foreigners in 2014. Furthermore, this 1000 units are most likely concentrating in Gurney/Tanjung area. Hmm….that probably is the justification of high prices in these areas.