By Adrian Lim
KUCHING, July 2: The property market in Sarawak is expected to remain weak in the short-term due to Covid-19 and less property transactions recorded.
Kuching branch’s chairman Sim Kiang Chiok said the Covid-19 pandemic and the Movement Control Order (MCO) have halted work and property sales that had put a toll on the growth of the property market.
Nonetheless, he believed the property market would gradually recover as economic sectors are reopened and business confidence returns.
“With the (MCO) here and all over the world due to Covid-19, I foresee that the property market will be weak until the economic resumption and confidence in the business market are restored.
“In any property development, the tripartite relation of the developer, purchaser and the financier (banks) must be there in order to spur the property market.
“Now that we are in the recovery phase of the MCO and time is needed to restore market confidence and business activities,” he said in a statement.
Sim, who is a director of Sim Swee Yong Development and Construction Sdn Bhd said in the current transition period for the property market, there will be demand for property by top 20 per cent earners (T20), upper middle income class (M40) and those with stable employment such as the civil servants.
He added the federal government has also come up with measures in the economic stimulus package announced on June 5 to spur the property market.
Among those are the Home Ownership Campaign (HOC) and stamp duties exemption for the purchase of residential properties to generate interest in the property market.
Sim believed other measures announced by the federal government to rejuvenate the property market such as the exemption to pay the Real Property Gains Tax (RGPT) for up to three residential properties and lowering the financing margin for third housing loans are incentives that can boost the property market.
“My wish is that these incentives could be extended to all types of properties rather than limiting it to residential property only so that the effect of the property market can be more substantial,” he added. —DayakDaily
