Medical suites of 223 sq ft and starting price of RM414,000

Medical suites of 223 sq ft and starting price of RM414,000

A friend read this article about KL Wellness City which was just previewed (click here to know more) and asked if it makes sense for a 223 sq ft unit to be sold at starting price of RM414,000.

Before I explain based on my personal understanding of medical suites, let’s listen to what Datuk Dr. Colin Lee, managing director of KL Wellness City Sdn Bhd (KLWC) has to say. He said, “We have infused the design and elements that offer practising medical specialists the flexibility to optimise the use of space to suit their precise requirements and the freedom to make changes according to evolving needs.”

“We are confident this will enhance the specialists’ interest to own the suites as an investment in addition to running a practice here. We expect a take-up rate of 80 per cent, within the first three months of the first phase’s official launch.” Read here for the full article: KL Wellness City

Ownership of specialist clinics in hospitals

When we visit any specialist’s clinics in private hospitals, these clinics or can also be known as suites do not belong to the specialists. It belongs to the private hospitals. However, these units are very valuable to the specialists because many of their customers could have been the customer to this private hospital and thus, the potential patients were recommended by the private hospital. It’s a win-win situation for the specialist and the hospital.

Imagine a private hospital where there are no specialists… or one with very few specialists… This hospital is unlikely to be popular. At the same time, imagine the best specialists opening their own clinic outside the private hospitals. Chances are, they would have to slowly build up their patients from scratch unless they are just too good and the word of mouth becomes a powerful marketing tool.

Paying half a million for a medical suite?

I am very sure some of us have visited some of these specialists. I am also very sure we learnt later that the total ‘investment’ for us to get better is many hundreds just for a consultation and probably some medicine. If there are surgeries, even a minor one, the cost is likely to be in the thousands. I know because I have gone for kidney stone ops as well as appendicitis ops. The kidney stone one was many thousands per occasion and the appendicitis one, due to complications and ICU admission was over RM10,000.

Now imagine one full day of 8 hours. How many patients do you think a specialist could see per day? Let’s say every patient needs one full hour of the doctor’s time. That’s a minimum of 8 patients per day. As for the cost per visit, I am very sure most people would know, especially if you have been to any private hospital before. It’s certainly not RM100 yeah… I paid many times more than that even for a regular visit to the gynaecologist for my wife around 10 years ago. We did not calculate the number of surgeries for the specialist every month yet.

So, can the specialist afford the half a million ringgit for a medical suite? The answer is, it depends on how popular the specialist is. Generally, yes but not for all specialists and certainly not for the not-so-good ones.

Should the specialists get a unit then?

I have no idea yeah. I am not a medical specialist. I think the medical specialists need to make their own decision. Perhaps they can even just buy a unit and see how the situation pans out in the end. Perhaps the number of patients they could receive from their clinics within the private hospital is already too many? Only they would know. What I know also is that the number of specialists will continue to increase over time too.

Statistically, 1.22 million people travelled to Malaysia for medical and healthcare purposes. The revenue from these travellers was RM1.7billion. Info source here.

Based on these numbers, the average per person was close to RM2,000. These are just number of patients from medical tourism travellers yeah. It has yet to include the potential customers from the people residing in the Klang Valley and other states in Malaysia.

Medical Tourism will rise again

Yes, medical tourism will definitely be on a growth path once people could travel freely again. My ex-GM who’s a Japanese told me this long time ago and I think it is still be true today. “It’s easier and cheaper to fly to Malaysia for a minor operation including a few rounds of golf versus trying to book both the surgery and a few rounds of golf in Tokyo.” Happy understanding all the numbers yeah.

There are no links in this article to sign up and buy anything. Feel free to search for KL Wellness City contact via google.com if you do have interest. There is also no need to mention kopiandproperty.my as we do not receive any commission for units sold. Cheers.

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