Rehda: Address issue of unsold residential units

JOHOR Real Estate Housing Developer Association (Rehda) is urging the state government to address the property overhang in the state, especially unsold bumiputra units.

Its chairman Wong Boon Lang said Johor had the second highest residential overhang in the country in 2021 with 6,089 units, while Selangor recorded 6,095 and Penang had 5,493.

He said another pressing issue was the escalating cost of building materials, which could lead to an increase in the prices of houses.

“We hope the new state government can come up with measures to reduce property overhang in Johor,” he said, adding that Rehda committee members were looking forward to meeting new Mentri Besar Datuk Onn Hafiz Ghazi.

Wong also hoped the measures introduced by Onn’s predecessor Datuk Hasni Mohammad, including the public-private partnership (PPP) and the Johor State Housing Development Corporation (PKPJ) that is responsible for all housing matters in the state, would be continued.

He said credit should also go to former housing and local government committee chairman Ayub Jamil for these initiatives.

“The PPP is a win-win approach by allowing developers to surrender designated land approved for low-cost housing to the state without having to pay a penalty for not building any units,” said Wong.

He said that upon surrendering the land, developers were able to carry out the rest of the approved development without any restrictions.

He added that the state government could undertake the low-cost development on surrendered land in any way it deemed fit.

Currently, a developer has to pay RM40,000 per unit for not building low-cost houses under the Johor Housing Policy.

Wong said there were 153,000 of such units yet to be built on about 2,023ha in the state.

He said that in the past there was no clear ruling on the time frame to build these low-cost units and most developers did not build them in the earlier phases.

“We hope the MB will continue with the PPP and other existing proactive measures,” he added.