Malaysia’s Budget 2017 — A quick take on property

● Stamp duty exemption doubled to 100% on instruments of transfer and housing loan instruments to help reduce the cost of first home ownership. Exemption limited to houses valued up to RM300,000 for the period of Jan 1, 2017 to Dec 31, 2018.

● The rate of stamp duty on instruments of transfer of real estate worth more than RM1 million up from 3% to 4% effective Jan 1, 2018.

● A new, special “step-up” end-financing scheme for the PR1MA programme to reduce loan rejection rate. Application process to start from Jan 1, 2017. Scheme is in collaboration with the government, Bank Negara Malaysia, Employees Provident Fund and four local banks — Maybank, CIMB, RHB and AmBank.

● Grant of up to RM10k to be reintroduced to registered Residents Associations to buy security control equipment and for the cleanliness and maintenance of the neighbourhood. 

● Public servants' housing loan eligibility up from between RM120k and RM600k to between RM200k and RM750k. 

● Government to build 10,000 houses in urban areas for rental to eligible youths with permanent jobs. They may rent up to a maximum of five years, at a below-market rate.

● Government to complete 30,000 units of 1Malaysia Civil Servants Housing (PPA1M) priced from RM90k to RM300k — or 20% below market price.

● Introducing MyBeautiful New Home for the B40 (bottom 40% of households with monthly income of RM3.9k and below) with a RM200 million allocation. Kick-start with building 5,000 units (priced at RM40k to RM50k each). Government to finance RM20k with owners paying the rest in instalments. Houses to be built on owners' land; land permitted by the landowner; and land awarded by state governments. 

● The Ministry of Urban Wellbeing, Housing and Local Government gets RM134 million to build 9,850 houses under the People’s Housing Programme (PPR).

● A total of 11,250 People's Housing Programme (PPR) houses are being built. These will be sold from RM35k to RM42k — much lower than the construction cost of RM120k to RM160k.

● Government-linked companies (GLCs) and Perumahan Rakyat 1Malaysia (PR1MA) to get vacant land at strategic locations to build more than 30,000 houses. These will be sold from RM150k to RM300k — below the market price of RM250k to RM400k. 

● Some 5,000 units of People’s Friendly Home (PMR) will be built. Government to subsidise up to RM20k per unit.

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