Penang urged to look at bringing property prices down

PENANG (June 16): Penang Gerakan Youth legal and public complaints bureau chief Jason Loo Jieh Sheng has criticised the state government's guideline that restricted the purchase of properties by foreigners to only units above RM2 million on the island and RM1 million on the mainland.

He said what the government should do was to look into reducing the prices of properties in Penang by introducing guidelines that could curb speculation in the Penang property market.

"Reviewing the guidelines won't solve the housing problem faced by Penangites...the problem is that properties and houses in the state are too expensive, beyond the reach of wage-earners Penangites," he said in a statement today.

Loo was commenting on recent reports that state housing exco Jagdeep Singh Deo had said the government might revise present guidelines for foreign buyers in view of the declining value of the ringgit.

He said a guideline that restricted foreign buyers only looked good but was not practical since foreign investors and buyers were prepared to pay for the multimillion ringgit luxury properties.

The demand for expensive properties, he said, would encouraged the supply of such units so even if the threshold was increased to RM3 million, there would still be foreign buyers who could afford the price.

"Foreigners come here to invest. This is one of the reasons that have caused property prices to increase beyond what locals can afford.

"While the state government cannot solve this issue, it can only implement deceptive guidelines to deceive the voters," he said.

Loo said that there was a steady increase of foreigners buying properties in Penang from 2012 to 2014 with only a handful of them participating in the "Malaysia My Second Home" programme, so the state’s guidelines had proven to be ineffective.

He quoted data supplied by Jagdeep at the recent state assembly sitting that among foreign property owners in the state, those from Singapore had the most properties in Penang.

From 2008 until March this year, Singaporean-owned properties in Penang have amounted to 1,290 units, compared to only 460 units from 2001 to 2007.

This was followed by those owned by Indonesians who had bought 795 units between 2008 to March this year, compared to 269 units from 2001 to 2007.