Sheda: Relax rules for building affordable homes

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KUCHING: Sarawak Housing and Real Estate Developers’ Association (Sheda) is hoping that the state government can relax some of the existing criterias to build residential houses for the building of affordable homes.

Its president Joseph Wong said Sheda has submitted a proposal to the state government for certain requirements to build residential houses to be amended so that property developers will be able to build affordable houses besides having the flexiblity for its design.

“Sheda has proposed to the state government to relax some of the criterias to build residential houses.

“These include reducing front or rear setback requirement by three metres for landed development, removal of density control for residential development, adoption of ‘plot ratio’ density for high-rise residential development and removal of the existing mandatory low-cost house requirements or proposed levy quantum.

“The move will enable property developers to build affordable houses,” he told a press conference held at Borneo Convention Centre Kuching (BCCK) here yesterday.

He observed that there is increasing demand for affordable houses in Sarawak as those earning between RM3,000 to RM5,000 a month could not buy a house.

Additionally, he pointed out that there are between 30 to 40 per cent of the public that are not eligible to apply for low-cost housing as their income level have exceeded the requirements yet could not afford to buy houses which are being sold at market prices.

Therefore, he said Sheda would like to work with the state government to come up with a solution to build affordable houses.

Wong revealed that Sheda has approached some of the property developers in Sarawak and they have expressed keen interest to build affordable houses.

He believed that if the proposal can be approved, Sheda is looking at building 10,000 units of affordable houses in Sarawak over a period of five years with prices of RM250,000 and below.

Furthermore, Sheda is in the midst of setting up a website to gather data and statistics catering for the affordable housing segment.

Once the website is ready, he encouraged the public to register with Sheda as information relating to affordable houses can be sent to them.

Also present at the press conference were Sheda secretary-general Jee Chun Fah, Sheda assistant treasurer general Bobby Ting, BCCK operations director Gary James Pinchen and Absolute Cool Event (ACE) services and marketing director Terence Tan.

Wong disclosed that demand for residential houses in Sarawak has remained healthy as demand has outnumbered supply.

He noted the number of houses completed within a year in Sarawak ranged between 5,000 units to 8,000 units while there are still many people who are still looking to buy houses.

Moreover, he encouraged the public to invest into buying a house as he observed that house prices generally are on the uptrend.

Wong pointed out that house prices have tripled since the past 20 years due to increasing cost of building materials, labour, compliance cost and the price of land.