Personally, I would say on a macro level, that Malaysian properties will continue to be a hit among Singaporean and foreign investors.
Why?
Among the factors are that Malaysian land and properties are still one of the most affordable compared with other Asian countries. Asia is currently the favorite destination for foreign direct investments. In fact, Malaysia has a lenient foreign property purchase policy compared with its Asean neighbours. A foreigner can secure up to 70% loan from local commercial banks to finance his/her property purchase as long as the property is above RM1,000,000 in most parts of Malaysia. In Singapore, for the first property owners can only obtain 80% loan margin and 60% loan margin for second property!
One important fact is that the owner's rights over a Malaysian property is safeguarded in Malaysia's constitution. Prior to Malaysia's independence in 1957, most of the laws of United Kingdom were imported and either made into local legislation or simply applied as case laws. Malaysian law is also based on other jurisdictions namely Australia and India. The criminal law in Malaysia—the Criminal Procedure Code—was based on the Indian criminal code. Similarly, the Contracts Act is based on the Indian model. Malaysian land law is based on the Australian Torrens system.
Another pulling factor is due to the recent cooling measures implemented by the Singapore government that indirectly creates a demand for Malaysian properties. Scared to loose another seat to the opposition, the Singapore government is hard pressed to look towards Malaysia to solve its problem of high influx of foreign direct investments from China, India as well as affluent rich individuals or organisations in the west into Singapore.
Many Singaporean wage earners are unable to cope with the high property prices and inflation. Malaysia offers these Singaporean wage earners a chance to abandon their 3 or 4 bedroom apartments or condominiums in Singapore for a bungalow house in Malaysia.
With the recent announcement of the high-speed rail system linking the Kuala Lumpur to Singapore, you can be assured that the tourists, trade and services between the two(2)countries will increase exponentially.
Even the Malaysian opposition party, PKR, welcomed this news and took it to another level up by suggesting to link all the major states like Seremban, Ayer Keroh in Melaka, Muar and Johore Bahru and possibly Penang and Ipoh.
So in future, you can work in Singapore and stay in the Klang Valley as travelling time takes only 90mins.
The next welcoming news will be the announcement of the rapid transit system linking Johore Bahru to Singapore. On a really good day, you can get into Singapore from JB via land transport about between 45mins to 1 hr or as long as 90mins to 2 hrs on a bad day. In future, you take a MRT from JB to Singapore within 15mins or less. Many more Singaporeans can opt to stay in Johore Bahru and work in Singapore.
Hence, properties in Kuala Lumpur and Johore Bahru will continue to appeal investors.
So did all these good news happened overnight?
Have your heard of the "Nanning-Singapore Economic Corridor"? The Nanning-Singapore Economic Corridor consists of a cross-border economic channel between China and the ASEAN, that starts at Nanning and encompasses Hanoi in Vietnam, Vientiane in Laos, Phnom Penh in Cambodia, Bangkok in Thailand, Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, and Singapore.
To make this economic corridor a reality, the Nanning government and its Asean neighbours have identified the high speed rail as a means to link up. Basically you can be start from Nanning and end up in Singapore within half a day. Best part, you can easily stop over along the way and meet up with your friends and business associates without applying for a visa. Asean is currently hatching out a plan to implement an Unified Visa similar to that of European Union.
Yes! We are now living in exciting times. With so much government-to-government projects planned in the pipeline, there isn't enough time to sit back and expect a property bubble to happen anytime soon.
Supplementary Reading:
CONDO
INDUSTRIAL
SHOPLOT
LANDED HOUSES
GENERAL ELECTIONS
OTHERS
