GEORGE TOWN, Jan 29 — Penang today lauded Putrajaya’s proposal for a lower mortgage interest rate for house buyers in Malaysia.
Housing development committee chairman Jagdeep Singh Deo said the proposal is a good idea to reduce the financial burden of homeowners.
“We hope this proposal will prioritise first-time home buyers instead of millionaires,” he said in a press conference this morning.
Jagdeep was commenting on Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s announcement last week that lower house loan rates was proposed for the National Housing Policy 2.0.
The Penang lawmaker said Putrajaya should have invited housing state excos nationwide to attend any national meetings on housing issues so that each state can bring up housing issues in these meetings.
“We are still facing high loan rejection rates problems, not only in Penang, but other states as well,” he said.
Jagdeep said the National Housing Council can benefit from suggestions and proposals from respective states when coming up with new housing policies.
“This policy affects the housing sector in all states so it is pertinent to get everyone’s views,” he said.
He said it’s been a year since the Penang state government submitted a memorandum to Bank Negara on high loan rejection rates, however the central bank have yet to respond.
“There was nothing from Bank Negara, no meeting was held to discuss and rectify this issue at all,” he said.
Jagdeep said house buyers are still facing high loan rejection rates, preventing many from purchasing their first homes.
Despite this, he is confident that the housing industry in Penang is on a rising trend.
“We have seen a very healthy market where property transactions are concerned, whereby year on year for residential transactions, Q3 2016 saw transactions at a value of RM1,345.11 million as opposed to RM1,493.37 million for Q3 2017, which is an 11 per cent increase,” he said.
Earlier, Jagdeep visited the construction site of the state’s affordable housing project, The Rise, in Jalan SP Chelliah to check on the progress of the project.
The Rise is one of the state’s 18 affordable housing projects and is now about 65 per cent complete.
“Out of the 18 planned projects by the state, six have already begun and are at various stages of development,” he said.
One of the six projects, Suria at Bandar Cassia, Batu Kawan, with 520 units of affordable housing ranging from RM72,500 to RM220,000, was physically completed at the end of last year and is in the process of applying for Certificate of Completion and Compliance (CCC).
Three projects, including The Rise in George Town (2,093 units), Jiran Residenci in Butterworth (707 units) and Dua Residensi in Teluk Kumbar (694 units) are in various stages of completion while works on two projects — Sandilands Foreshore in George Town (806 units) and Ladang Bryan in Seberang Perai (76 units) — had just started.
