Penang's biggest housing woe - high loan rejection rate

The Penang Housing Department's biggest challenge is still the high loan rejection rate by banks which makes it difficult for buyers to own their homes, said state executive councillor Jagdeep Singh Deo.

In his report card on his 11 years in government including one year under the Pakatan Harapan rule in Putrajaya, Jagdeep said this issue must be addressed by all stakeholders especially the state government.

"We also hope that Putrajaya will assist Penang in finally delivering some affordable housing under its federal programmes," Jagdeep said at a press conference in George Town today.

"While we welcome several initiatives including the exemption for stamp duty at the federal level and exemption such as the three percent approval fee for foreigners at the state level, we must continue to work together to address the high loan rejection rate by banks especially for first-time home buyers," he said.

The rejection rate is about 70 percent, making it difficult for those in the lower income group to own houses.

Jagdeep also listed all pledges which were achieved or surpassed noting some were still in various stages of implementation.

In terms of affordable housing, Jagdeep said 102,054 units of low-cost, low medium-cost and affordable housing have been built or are in various stages of being built or approved to be built. This surpassed the pledge of 75,631 units made for GE14.

"Some RM206.6 million has been spent to maintain over 50 public housing schemes and private low and low-medium housing schemes which will be continued," he added.

He said another achievement included Penang being the first state with 100 percent LED street lights and 1,175 units of CCTVs installed, surpassing the pledged number of 1,000 CCTVs.

"Penang again became the first state to install facial recognition CCTVs; it is also the first state to implement a Smart Parking system," he said.

Jagdeep said other achievements included:

• Penang was the first state not only in Malaysia but in Asia to conduct a Terragraph pilot project for better broadband delivery;
  
• Instead of planting another 100,000 trees in Penang as pledged, the state government intended to double the figure to 200,000 to combat climate change;
  
• 96% of public wet markets and 92% of public hawker complexes achieved Grade A and Grade B ratings for cleanliness and he had instructed that all of them achieve a Grade A rating within the next 12 months;
  
• Penang again was the first state to have digital libraries whereby the third phase (Penang Islamic Digital Library) was currently in the process of being built on the mainland;
  
• Penang had the highest recycling rate of 42% in Malaysia where 352,669.8 kg of recyclable waste had been collected;
  
• the Penang State Structure Plan 2030 was approved by the state government and the National Physical Planning Council;
  
• 139 non-Islamic places of worship were assisted by the Penang state government under at a cost of RM5.46 million and this effort will be continued;

Several new landmark icons in Penang were expected such as the Gurney Wharf, the North and Eastern Shorefront projects and the Green Connectors project. - Mkini