GEORGE TOWN, Oct 5 — Penang now aims to build 220,000 units of affordable housing in the state by 2030, state exco Jagdeep Singh Deo announced today.
He said the state had initially planned to build 180,000 affordable housing units by 2030 but he had proposed to increase it by another 40,000 units.
“I proposed this to the state exco about two weeks ago and it was approved so we will aim to build 220,000 affordable housing units especially at a time when everyone is affected by the Covid-19 pandemic,” he said in a press conference at his office today.
He said a total 106,742 affordable housing units are now underway, some of which were already built.
Out of the 106,742 units, 34,388 units were completed, 20,180 units are under construction, and 52,174 units were approved and in the planning stage.
Out of the total 106,742 units, 26,616 are low-cost housing priced at RM42,000 each, 26,995 are low medium cost units priced at RM72,500 each, while 53,131 are affordable housing units priced at RM300,000 and below.
Jagdeep said the targeted 220,000 units will consist of all three types of affordable housing from the RM42,000 low-cost units to the RM300,000 units.
Jagdeep said the Selection and Process Enhancement Committee (SPEC) has met 58 times since it was formed to approve applications for low cost, low medium cost and affordable housing units.
“Up to today, the committee has approved a total of 54,138 eligible applications for affordable housing,” he said.
Out of the 54,138 applications, 25,913 were for low cost units, 10,930 for low medium cost units, 16,683 for affordable housing units and 612 for rent-to-own units.
He said the committee has been clearing the long waiting lists for low cost and low medium cost units since its formation in 2013.
“There were applicants who had been on the waiting list since 1976 when I took over the portfolio in 2013 so I decided to form SPEC to speed up the approval process,” he said.
He said there is no waiting list of low-cost housing units in Central Seberang Perai now so anyone eligible was to apply for it now will immediately get a unit.
“There are also no waiting lists for low cost and low medium cost housing units in the South-west district on the island and Northern Seberang Perai under both the ethnic Indian and Chinese quotas,” he said.
He said the offer of affordable housing units are based on supply and demand and since there are no waiting lists in some districts, he had suggested for the units in the districts with no waiting lists to be opened to applicants for other districts.
“Now that we have better transportation and connection, people can live in different districts so I proposed to SPEC to open up the extra stock to applicants for other districts and leave it to them to see if they are interested,” he said.
He said the highest demand is still for units in the North-east district of the island, or George Town, but supply is low as there were not enough lands to build affordable housing in that district.
