Housing loans top household debt, reports Finance Ministry

KUALA LUMPUR: Housing loans made up the largest chunk of household debt in Malaysia at 60.5%, it was revealed.

The Finance Ministry stated that the aggregate national household debt stood at RM1.53 trillion between 2018 and 2023.

In aggregate, it said the household debt for 2022 was RM1.45 trillion, followed by RM1.38 trillion (2021,) RM1.32 trillion (2020), RM1.25 trillion (2019) and RM1.19 trillion (2018).

“The ratio of household debt to gross domestic product (GDP) at the end of 2023 also slightly increased to 84.2% compared with 82% in 2018,” it said.

The ministry was replying Labis MP, Pang Hok Liong in the Dewan Rakyat yesterday who asked the ministry to reveal the country’s aggregate household debt between 2018 and 2023.

For the period from 2018 to 2023, the ministry said the average annual growth of household debt was 5.1%.

Other household debts included vehicle loans at 13.2%, personal financing (12.6%) and loans for other purposes, including non-residential property purchases, credit card debt, securities and others.

“The annual growth of household debt was primarily driven by housing and vehicle loans.

This followed various home-ownership incentives offered by the government and the private sector, as well as sales and service tax (SST) incentives for motor vehicle purchases between 2020 and 2022,” it said.