Penang won't lift moratorium on resale of homes
The Penang government has no intention to lift cooling measures for the housing market and will continue its focus on providing adequate affordable housing.
State executive councillor on housing Jagdeep Singh Deo said such measures were in place for the past three years and there has been "positive results" thus far.
However, there was a still a strong demand for affordable housing or properties priced RM500,000 and below.
Penang won't follow Putrajaya's lead in lifting cooling measures on property sector.
The Penang government has no intention to lift cooling measures for the housing market and will continue its focus on providing adequate affordable housing.
State executive councillor on housing Jagdeep Singh Deo said such measures were in place for the past three years and there has been "positive results" thus far.
However, there was a still a strong demand for affordable housing or properties priced RM500,000 and below.
According to the Raine and Horne International study, said Jagdeep, 76 percent of property transactions were within this category.
"We will continue to enforce these cooling measures, because it should be noted that in other jurisdictions like Hong Kong and Singapore, their experiences show that lifting such measures too quickly upon achieving results will only cause a rebound," he said.
Jagdeep urged developers to take note of this trend and take advantage of the various guidelines available to them to develop affordable housing.
Three PR1MA projects in Penang
Yesterday, the National House Buyers Association (HBA) criticised Putrajaya's decision to reduce the moratorium on the resale of 1Malaysia People’s Housing (PR1MA) houses from 10 to five years.
The household income eligibility of PR1MA buyers have also been increased from RM10,000 to RM15,000. The HBA said PR1MA was not supposed to be "attractive" from the onset, particularly to speculators.
The HBA said the initiative was to ensure eligible first-time house buyers have access to affordable homes and a "shelter over their head" and that they be bound by sincere commitment.
He said the “ugly face of speculation” will surely arise if PR1MA buyers are keen on the monetary gains from selling the property within a few years.
Jagdeep said that although PR1MA was initiated by Putrajaya in 2012, the first applications were only received in late 2015.
He said the Penang government had approved three PR1MA projects, located in Tasek Gelugor, Bukit Gelugor and Batu Ferringhi respectively. In total, all three projects will provide 4,742 homes.
