I have received / seen this piece of news a few times. “NST: Developers expect glut in property market this year” and here’s another one, “Edgeprop.my: Developers foresee dark times due to glut, worse than 1999 crisis” Somehow, everyone loves negative news. Even for kopiandproperty.my, every time I write about bad news, the clicks go up. Now you know why it’s important to occasionally write about negative news? Haha.
Anyway, the articles highlighted views from former Penang Real Estate and Housing Developers Association (Rehda) chairman Datuk Jerry Chan who said they are concerned with the oversupply of homes in the country and are expecting this year to be worse than 1999, when the Asian Financial Crisis was in full swing. With this view, they hope the authorities would do more to counter the situation.
Datuk Jerry Chan shares that in 1999, there was no severe glut and it was easier to buy a property then. He said in Penang alone, there was about 40 per cent unsold units, involving affordable and luxury categories. The demand from buyers are available but he said tight lending rules were a major hindrance. “The government must revisit the existing lending guidelines if it is serious about helping Malaysians own homes,” he added. Current Rehda chairman Datuk Toh Chin Leong said the property glut was mostly in the RM300,000 category. He said, “In these lower priced ranges, most of the buyers could not get loans so there is an oversupply of these properties.” As for excesses in other price categories, he said the problem is less severe. He said, “If we look at the middle range of between RM600,000 and RM800,000 that are in good locations, we can still sell these properties.” Edgeprop.my: Developers foresee dark times due to glut, worse than 1999 crisis”
I do not think the situation today is so severe to be compared to some crisis years. However the issue of unsold units are real and it’s because of the mismatch in what was built versus what’s really needed. Price is an issue mostly. Banks are also not willing to lend when their own valuation showed that the price is too high. This is why sometimes they no longer give 90 percent but maybe 80 percent loan to buyers who apply. All these are then compounded by negative sentiment which meant that more time is needed to clear them. Perhaps we see the result of March then. Happy following. Like more articles like this? Like Kopiandproperty.com FB page for daily FREE updates.
written on 31 Jan 2019
Next suggested article: 20,000 units with discounts in March 2019.
Leave a Reply