4 things to know about the current state of Malaysian real estate
4 things to know about the current state of Malaysian real estate
Straight out of PropertyGuru’s Hari Krishnan mouth
Malaysia has not been feeling the warmth lately in terms of real estate transactions, thanks to a weakening ringgit and an economic slowdown. Bloomberg TV Malaysia’s Sophie Kamaruddin recently had the opportunity to speak with PropertyGuru’s chief business officer Hari Krishnan about the current market sentiment.
Here’s what he had to say about the state of Malaysian property and the hopeful times that lie ahead.
1–There’s still strong demand
PropertyGuru’s recent survey, Malaysia Property Market Sentiment Survey Report 2016, shows that almost 60 percent of consumers are still looking to transact or buy a house within the next six months. Krishnan distinguished two primary sets of buyers emerging: those seeking properties less than 1,000 sqft in size and those seeking greater than 2,000 sqft.
“There is a strong demand for properties in Malaysia. Properties still remain an interesting asset for consumers and investors despite the sluggish market,” said Krishnan.
“We believe that over the next six to nine months demand is going to reach that point where it’s going to shift things,” he told Kamaruddin.
2–Buyers are more informed
Cooling financial measures recently set in place by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) has only led to buyers making more informed property decisions. For the first time, scores of Malaysians are doing more introspection vis-a-vis projects, neighbourhoods, or developers and checking their credit histories before they access capital.
“Most buyers nowadays are checking their CTOS credit report online and realise their affordability rate before approaching the bank,” Krishnan said.
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3–It’s not just Kuala Lumpur
Hari has picked up a spike in business activity away from the capital city lately. He specifically named such places as Puchong, Klang, Johor Bahru, Nusajaya and Skudai as five markets seeing increasing interest on the PropertyGuru portal.
“You are seeing folks looking for those smaller houses. They’re willing to move farther away from the city centres.”
4–Drones, drones, drones!
In anticipation of this turnaround in demand, PropertyGuru has introduced drone videos, giving buyers a better perspective of a prospective buy and the infrastructure that surrounds it.
“Since people love coming to us for information, we thought about how we could make things easier for them,” said the property Guru.
Coupled with this tool, 3D tours will let consumers on the PropertyGuru site virtually take down walls and give them a sense of place.
“This and the drone videos will definitely give them an idea of where and what they are investing in,” he said.
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Source: Property Report