KUALA LUMPUR — BERSATU Puchong Division Associate Wing chief Dato’ Gan Yong Hwa said Housing and Local Government Minister Nga Kor Ming had proposed that affordable housing prices be determined according to the income levels, demographic structure, location and market demand of each area under the National Housing Policy 2026–2035.
He said that without a clearly disclosed calculation formula, price ceilings and adequate safeguards, the proposal would represent a highly risky policy direction.
Gan said the government’s concept of tailoring housing prices to local conditions might appear reasonable on the surface. However, the public’s main concern was not how much big data or artificial intelligence the government intended to use, but whether ordinary families and young people could genuinely afford the units eventually classified as “affordable housing”.
“Nga Kor Ming even cited data from the National Property Information Centre indicating that an affordable home in the Klang Valley could cost up to RM500,000, compared with approximately RM300,000 in Kelantan.
“For young people who have just entered the workforce, ordinary wage earners, young families and gig workers with unstable incomes, in what sense is a RM500,000 home ‘affordable’?”
Gan said that if affordable homes in supposedly high-income areas such as Selangor, Kuala Lumpur, Penang and Johor Bahru were priced between RM400,000 and RM500,000, home ownership would become even further beyond the reach of urban youths.
He said the government could not assume that everyone living in an area could afford a more expensive home simply because the area recorded a higher average income.
Neither should differences in local income levels be used to justify house prices that were already excessively high.
“The original objective of the policy should be to adjust house prices to the people’s actual ability to pay, rather than devise a new formula that allows already expensive homes to be given an ‘affordable’ label.”
Gan pointed out that the government had yet to explain clearly which calculation method would be used to determine the prices.
Among the unanswered questions were whether the calculation would use average or median income; individual income, total household income or disposable income after deducting living expenses; and whether the geographical scope would be defined by state, district, local authority area or individual community.
“An area may include high-income earners who make tens of thousands of ringgit a month. At the same time, it may also be home to young employees, hawkers, food delivery riders and ordinary families earning between RM3,000 and RM5,000 a month.
“If the government averages everyone’s income to determine house prices, those who ultimately benefit may be the market and property developers, rather than the people who need affordable housing the most.”
Gan stressed that affordable housing could not be defined solely by its selling price.
The government must also consider whether buyers can secure bank financing and afford the down payment, as well as whether they would still have sufficient income to cover food, transportation, education, healthcare and household expenses after paying their monthly mortgage instalments.
“If a home is labelled affordable but people cannot obtain financing, cannot afford the down payment or are unable to maintain a basic standard of living after paying their monthly instalments, then ‘affordable’ is merely a label appearing in a government report.”