Malaysia is an obvious destination for a number of reasons:

• No taxes on overseas income (guaranteed until 2036)
• Great, affordable healthcare
• Great, affordable education
• Amazing food options
• Very affordable
• Extremely safe

How to get the My Malaysia Second Home (MM2H) residency?

There are multiple tiers of residency, the most affordable one being:

• Deposit $150,000 in an interest bearing account (or in Islamic finance) AND buy a property worth at least $140,000
• However you can use up to half of your $150,000 deposit to contribute towards the property purchase, making the total investment about ~$250,000 including processing fees, property transaction fees, etc
• You can include your children under the age of 35, your spouse, your parents, and even your parents-in-law
• The residency is valid for 5 years, and is easily renewable as long as you keep the investments and don’t get caught doing something you shouldn’t be doing

I discussed this in detail earlier this year with TG, my MM2H processing agent in Malaysia

Here’s the catch

Real estate in Malaysia, though not particularly expensive, suffers from constant oversupply and thus poor rental yields. So if you buy a place to rent it out, you won’t make great returns. However this also means that rents are extremely affordable for great quality.

In this video with Serena, my real estate agent in Penang, we looked at two different condos and ran the ROI numbers. What stunned me was a massive apartment valued at over 1 million USD that can be rented for less than $2,500 per month. As a tenant, this is an amazing deal.

This video with Serena will give you an overview of the type of accommodation you can choose in Penang. My recommended strategy would be to buy the minimum to meet the MM2H threshold, but to then rather rent a place on the open market for personal use.

https://youtu.be/n5V72kHFtxA?si=mgcDu93dxxalW-GE

In many ways, you have to look at the poor-yielding condo you’re buying as a tax and health insurance product. This condo is a gateway to possible 0% taxes, affordable and quality healthcare, and if you have children, great education.

In a world of increasing taxes and decreasing safety everywhere, Malaysia stands out as a balanced option that hasn’t turned into a complete police state, unlike many very safe / low tax jurisdictions.

A flexible program

• The minimum yearly physical presence requirement of 90 days is for the family as a whole. So if you are three in the family, you should spend a combined 90 days in Malaysia to not have issues at renewal.
• Applicants above the age of 50 do not have any physical presence requirements, making the MM2H a great plan B for this demographic.

Who is getting residency in Malaysia these days?

• Asians who want to benefit from the tax situation
• Westerners who want better healthcare, quality education, a lower cost of living, and who don’t want to pay taxes
• Muslims from Western countries who want to live in a modern country more aligned with their values but without having to live in the Gulf where they typically get treated like second class or third class residents

Here is the full guide to obtaining the MM2H residency in Malaysia
You can also contact Serena my real estate agent in Penang

To a World of Opportunities,

The Wandering Investor.

If you want to read more such articles on other real estate markets in the world, go to the bottom of my International Real Estate Services page.

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Transcript of “MM2H real estate in Penang, Malaysia – full ROI analysis on luxury condos”

LADISLAS MAURICE: Hello, everyone. Ladislas Maurice of The Wandering Investor. Today, we are in beautiful Penang in Malaysia, and we’ll be looking at real estate options for the MM2H program here in Malaysia. It’s interesting, because when you are a resident here, a tax resident here, and not anywhere else, or if you’re not American, you do not have any taxes to pay on foreign-earned income. Real estate here gets you access to this tax regime.

Serena, you’ve been a realtor here for a long time, in Penang?

SERENA: Yeah. Welcome to Penang.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Thank you very much. You’ve helped a lot of people buy real estate to obtain the MM2H?

SERENA: I don’t do the obtaining of MM2H visa, but I introduce a lot of them to purchase properties, whether or not they have MM2H.

What do real estate investors look for in Penang?

LADISLAS MAURICE: Okay, fantastic. What are some of the key attributes that expats, typically, look for when they’re buying property here?

SERENA: They’re normally looking at condominiums with sea view, and we have something special here called the super condominium, because they’re super in sizes. You’re going to be seeing one of them shortly. And also, apart from condominiums, some expats would generally go for houses with large lands, because they may be coming here with your family, and dogs, perhaps. And also, some of them will be looking at George Town, because George Town City is UNESCO-listed. We have heritage homes that you can refurbish into really nice homes.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. We’ll check out two properties, do all of the numbers for them in terms of ROI, rental yields, etc., to really see how interesting it is. From a pure financial investment point of view, you’ll see not that much. And then also it’s just good to see what the rentals are like, because you’ll see rents are really affordable here in Penang. We’ll check out an apartment in this building, actually, in a little bit. It’s over a million dollars. A bit over a million dollars for an apartment, but it is absolutely massive, and the rent is really low. You’ll see, from an investment point of view, a bit questionable, but from a lifestyle point of view, from a tax point of view, it makes sense here in Malaysia. Fantastic. We’ll go check out the first property now.

SERENA: Shall we go? Let’s go.

Lifestyle, food and culture in Penang

LADISLAS MAURICE: Serena, there’s a big car culture here in Penang.

SERENA: I think so. Yeah, there are a lot of cars on the road.

LADISLAS MAURICE: It’s one of the slight drawbacks, I would say, to living in Penang, there’s a surprising amount of traffic. This being said, when you live in one of those kind of super condos, you don’t feel it that much because you’ve got everything there. You’ve got restaurants, typically, a little supermarket. I mean, the ordering-in culture here is massive. There are all these apps. Grab, you can order food from every restaurant in town, so [laughs] people just spend a lot of time in their condos and then just go to the beach.

SERENA: I can agree with that. But also, there are a lot of options out there, whether it’s the Hawker Fare, or fine dining options, or you can choose to home-cook your meals, there are various choices. And food is amazing here, by the way, if you haven’t known, if you haven’t found out yet.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah, the food is good. As a Westerner as well, I like to eat Western food once in a while. I can’t eat Asian food every day.

SERENA: [laughs]

LADISLAS MAURICE: And there are a lot of good supermarkets here with Western food as well, so this is good. It’s comfortable, as a Westerner, to move to Penang. You’ve got the best of both worlds. You’ve got all the Western food, if you want, and then all the delicious Asian food I mean, literally here, it’s Malaysian, Chinese, Indian food, and then, but you can have anything you want, Thai, Korean, Japanese, and the quality is great, and the prices are, quite frankly, unbeatable. And it’s not like you’re going to catch food poisoning here, either.

SERENA: No.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Unlike in some other Asian countries where, if you’re a little sensitive, you can fall sick. Here, this doesn’t happen.

Tour of condominium in Tamarind Penang

SERENA: We’re at Tamarind. Over here, there are two blocks, and we’re going to be seeing one unit that is close by to the pool area, so you can check out the facilities as well. The location is Tanjung Tokong. In particular, it’s called Seri Tanjung Pinang. It’s near the marina, and it’s also walking distance to amenities, eateries, restaurants, and shopping malls. It’s a very convenient location for people to stay and is quite in demand with renters as well as people that are looking for a forever home. It’s freehold. And the size of the condo we’re looking at is approximately 1,200 square feet.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah. And I think a recurring theme here in Penang, and generally speaking, in Malaysia, is convenience. Everything is convenient here, things just work, so you don’t really waste too much time when you’re trying to get things done.

SERENA: And I also want to add that most condos here, they do come with allocated parking bays. This condo, in particular, it gives you two parking bays. I kind of missed 666.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah. And Serena was given the number 666, so that’s not really a good sign for this viewing.

SERENA: [laughs] Okay, so here’s the parcel collection spot for the residents. And if you’re not home, if you’re traveling, or if you’re working, when you come back, your parcel is always safe here, because you have a security guard guarding it for you all the time.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Not that theft is much of an issue here.

SERENA: [laughs] Yes, it’s fairly safe to live around here. Okay, so we’re right here in the Tamarind condominium, in Seri Tanjung Pinang. It’s near the marina. It’s near the sea. It has great facilities. And the size of the apartment is 1,240 square feet. It has three bedrooms and two bathrooms. You have a wonderful balcony over here, which you can overlook the facilities, the pool, and, well, you can see the sea from far distance, so here.

LADISLAS MAURICE: This is really nice. This is why a lot of families are moving to Penang, because of this, exactly. How much is the rent here?

SERENA: Approximately, RM 3,000 to RM 4,000 per month.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool, so really not that much. We’re looking at $700, $800 a month, and that would include everything. It’s the landlord that has to pay for all the HOA and all these things. For $700, $800 a month, you can live in a three-bedroom apartment, two-bathroom. There’s an international school right next door.

SERENA: Yeah, the Stonyhurst is right next door, so it’s walking distance from here. And also, we did mention about the selling price. It is for sale at currently asking price is $270k.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool, all right.

SERENA: And it’s negotiable.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. Everything is very negotiable here in Penang. We’ll have a bit of a discussion around this. But essentially, this is the thesis. You can buy an apartment like this. You live here. There’s an international school. You don’t pay taxes on foreign-earned income here in Malaysia. Healthcare is very affordable, high quality. Penang is a medical tourism destination. And then you just sit here on your balcony, and your kids run around, they’re in the water, they can go swimming. It’s very safe, no pedo is going to run away with your kid. [laughs] The place is very safe and very family-friendly, so a lot of people are opting for this lifestyle. And not just Westerners who want to save on taxes.

Have you had a few clients as well? Because I’m seeing this in a lot of other markets, in Egypt, in Turkey as well, where it’s Muslims that live in Western countries. They feel they’re not quite aligned with the values anymore. They made their money, and now they want to go somewhere else, and then they choose Malaysia, because it’s so comfortable for them from a religious point of view, from a values point of view, but it’s still very much first world.

SERENA: Yes, we’re multicultural, we’re multilingual, but English is enough to get you around. Everybody speaks English. Otherwise, a lot of people here speak Mandarin as well, and Malay, and Tamil, of course.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. All right, let’s go look at the apartment. I mean, the finishings are quite good. The floor is hardwood, which is nice.

Different types of property ownership in Malaysia for MM2H program

LADISLAS MAURICE: Can you elaborate a little bit on the different types of property ownership here in Malaysia? Because it’s a little confusing at times.

SERENA: Okay, in terms of tenure, we have freehold and leasehold properties, and majority of the properties here are freehold. Normally, we would encourage people to purchase freehold properties, because if you’re purchasing leasehold properties, you don’t see as high as capital appreciation compared to freehold properties in general. And also, we have two different types of properties, whether they are strata titled or they are individual titled. Strata title means something like this, a condominium, or a gated and guarded house in the neighborhood, sharing facilities, and you pay a maintenance fee. And individual title means you own the land. You are not subject to any strata act law or anything like that. And that kind of property, the threshold for foreigners to purchase is higher compared to condominium, which is strata title.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Except if you’re applying for the MM2H where the minimum is $140,000, approximately, RM 600,000?

SERENA: Yeah.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Just a small question as well. I see there are different classifications in terms of buildings. Some are residential, some are commercial. Do they all qualify for the MM2H, and what’s the difference between this?

SERENA: It is advisable that you go for residential properties only if you want to qualify for the MM2H criteria for purchasing above RM 600k.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Why?

SERENA: Because if it’s a commercial property, then MM2H doesn’t allow. It’s only for you to purchase residential property, two units per ticket.

LADISLAS MAURICE: And that’s a bit problematic in the sense that a commercial license, even if it’s a building that looks residential, allows you to do Airbnb. And residential here you cannot do Airbnb, right?

SERENA: Yes, you’re right, because you have the committee, and they would not allow for that because of purely security, and also the common facilities might not be as well maintained as if it’s fully owned by residents only.

LADISLAS MAURICE: What’s the minimum lease that you can do in a residential building that does not have a commercial license? Why am I asking this? Because a lot of people who do the MM2H, potentially, just want to spend two, three months of the year here, the rest of the time they would like to rent out.

SERENA: Normally, landlords would prefer minimum a year tenancy. Over here, we don’t refer to tenancies as leases, because leases are only applicable to tenancies that are more than three years. Typically, people would rent for minimum a year and above. And there are tenants that would prefer to rent short-term, but landlords would generally not prefer. And also, some building managements would prefer not as well.

LADISLAS MAURICE: For example, let’s say, I buy this place, and I want to do the MM2H. I want to spend only three months per year here in Malaysia.

SERENA: That’s fine.

LADISLAS MAURICE: And I would like to be able to rent out the apartment for the rest of the nine months, but I’m not allowed to do Airbnb. How do I strike a balance?

SERENA: Okay, we can look for tenants that would want to rent for perhaps six months to nine months, but there’s always a catch to it, because why would they rent for such a short-term period? Typically, landlords here would go for tenants with a certain long-stay visas, for example, the MM2H, or work visa, or guardian visas. And if they don’t have that sort of visas for long stay here, that means they can’t qualify to stay more than 90 days in Penang. And therefore, normally, what we would advise landlords to do if they really want the tenant is that we would advise for landlords to collect an advance rental payment to secure their interest.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Essentially, there’s not that much of a market if you want to do midterm rentals between six and nine months whilst you’re away. This is important to note.

Rental yield calculation in Penang, Malaysia

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. Let’s do all of the ROI numbers for this apartment. Cool, so the price is about $270,000. What are the closing costs, roughly?

SERENA: Closing costs for buying a property as a foreigner here is typically about 10% to 12%.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Okay, so not low. The rent, you said, between RM 3,000 and RM 4,000. We’ll use RM 3,500 per month. Property management, generally, about 10%. What about fees for finding tenants for one-year lease?

SERENA: Typically, agents would charge one month fee to secure a tenant for you. And upon that, if you would want the agent to manage the property for you, because you’re not physically here, or is inconvenient for you, agents would charge at approximately rate of 10% per month of a rental amount.

LADISLAS MAURICE: What about the vacancy rate? What should we take into account here? Because there’s a fair amount of vacancy here in Penang.

SERENA: Yeah, this one here is fairly low because it’s very near to great amenities and it has great facilities. It’s in a great location. It’s in a desirable location, actually, and is also very near to international schools, so your tenant selection is quite big compared to other parts of Penang Island. It really depends on what’s around you, because people want to stay nearby to where they are. And also, we were talking about cars earlier, so there are a lot of cars in Penang Island links simply because we have a lack of infrastructure. We don’t have a train yet, but it’s coming.

LADISLAS MAURICE: There’s a train coming to Penang?

SERENA: Yeah, from the airport to town, but it’s going to take some time. And we also have buses, but generally, people over here prefer to drive, because it’s a very tiny island, after all, and going from one place to another is not really, really long.

LADISLAS MAURICE: All right, so for the numbers, we’ll use a vacancy rate of two months per year, roughly.

SERENA: I would say so, yeah.

LADISLAS MAURICE: What about the monthly charges, all of them, so, HOA, infrastructure fund, property tax, land tax, how much per month, roughly?

SERENA: I would say, approximately, for management fee, that includes maintenance fee and sinking fund is less than RM 500 per month. And in terms of taxes, biannually, I would say, less than RM 130 per month.

LADISLAS MAURICE: And it’s the landlord that has to pay all of these, correct?

SERENA: Correct. The tenant would pay for water, electricity, internet, and a monthly rental, but the landlord would bear the expenses, that includes all the taxes that we mentioned, and also insurance.

LADISLAS MAURICE: What about a budget for incidentals? If you need to replace something, or there’s a leak or something?

SERENA: It depends on the quality of the building and the age of the building as well. But in general, I would say, for this size, which is less than 1,300 square feet, less than RM 2,500 per year.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. All right, great. Look, when you do the numbers in terms of return on investment, in terms of cash flow, etc., before income tax, that’s a separate topic, you’re looking at 1.6% a year. Is this an interesting cash flow investment? Absolutely not. Are there any interesting cash flow investments in Malaysia? Not really. This is not a market where you come and try to make cash flow. It’s also not a market where you can expect massive capital gains. I mean, the prices are fair. This is roughly $2,300 per square meter, and a bit over $200 a square foot, so the prices are not cheap-cheap, but they’re also not particularly expensive. But it’s not a market that’s heavily levered, either. Prices don’t go up that much, they don’t go down that much, the market is pretty stable. I’d say it’s probably even more of a buyer’s market here in Penang?

Investing in Penang for lifestyle and tax advantages

SERENA: I would say that, yeah, it’s the buyer’s market for some time. And people buy in Penang, typically, not for rental yield, per se. Like you said, it’s not that high. There’s a certain level of capital appreciation, if you can wait over time. But most people buy because of the quality lifestyle that you can get over here compared to neighboring countries that are perhaps metropolitan cities. And also, the standard of living is fairly good. It’s a relaxed environment. Some people choose here to relocate here, perhaps not most parts of the year, perhaps just to escape winter. They might not even apply for MM2H program and they own a property over here, which is totally fine, as long as it’s above the threshold that I mentioned earlier.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Where are most of the foreign buyers from? Are there a lot of mainland Chinese investors?

SERENA: Not exactly. Most of them come from Singapore. And then you have investors and buyers and relocators from Hong Kong, under MM2H program as well. And we have, generally, UK, not so much of US, a lot of Australians. And also, we have this category of buyers called, I call them the returning Malaysians, because they are Malaysians, but they have gone to other parts of the world to work, and finally, they decide to retire, and they would come back to Penang, whether or not they’re from Penang.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah, interesting. This is a tax product. Look at it this way, it’s a tax and lifestyle product. If you look at it this way, it makes sense. If you’re just coming here for cash flow, or capital appreciation, just go somewhere else, there are better markets for this in the world. And people have to understand that also, in the context of Asia, people view property differently than they do in Western countries. In Western countries, we’re usually quite focused on cash flow. In Asian countries, a lot less, which is why you see cash flow numbers that are a lot lower, and which is also why, when you have, suddenly, Chinese people being obsessed with Vancouver, prices go to such a level that it doesn’t really make sense from a cash flow point of view for us Westerners, but for them, it still makes sense, because they look at property differently.

You have to come here, when you invest in Asia, with a different mindset. Whether you want to invest with this mindset or not, is a different story, but just without even looking at all these factors, really, you’re buying a tax product. This is how I choose to look at it, tax and lifestyle product. When I see this, and I see the cash flows that are not very interesting, I’m tempted to just aim for the minimum in terms of the MM2H, which is just $140,000. Can I then just rent something else on the side?

SERENA: You can. In fact, a lot of our clients, what they do is, when they apply for MM2H visa, they’re being advised by the MM2H agent to purchase a property that is at a minimum of RM 600k, which is a hugely reduced threshold from RM 1 million or RM 3 million, as I earlier explained.

LADISLAS MAURICE: RM 600k?

SERENA: Yeah, RM 600k. What they do is they buy a property that adheres to that, RM 600k, they have us rent them out, and then they would spend some money to rent a super-sized condominium, which we will check out later, which has size over 6,000 square feet, smack by the beach, and you have such a big space, and most of them just living just the two of them, you know?

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah. I think this is the play. And also, when you go for, so what, $140,000 would get you, what, a one-bedroom in this building?

SERENA: There’s no one-bedroom building. One-bedroom buildings units are not typically popular here. There are choices like that, but normally, they’re commercial titled. Generally, developers would build properties that have at least two bedrooms, majority three bedrooms and two bathrooms and two car parks.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. You’d get a two-bedroom, two-bathroom, and some inferior development. Whatever, you rent it out, you make your 1.5% a year, or you do like Chinese investors, and you leave it empty, and then you just rent a really nice place for yourself and your family. Again, because the cap rates are so low, the rental yields are so low, it just makes more sense to rent than to buy.

SERENA: Also, for one-bedrooms, they are available, but they are not really popular here, because if you can rent apartments with more rooms, more space, why would a foreigner do that when they can do it elsewhere? They will take advantage of what Penang can offer.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool, all right. Look, we’re going to go check out that other apartment, which is just absolutely massive. And you’ll see what you can get for a bit over $2,000 a month of rent here, it is gigantic. Cool. All right, let’s do this.

SERENA: Okay. Hello.

Tour of 5-bedroom luxury sea view condo in Penang

LADISLAS MAURICE: We went through this apartment, everything about it is huge. I mean, including the door, just massive place. How many square feet?

SERENA: 580 square meters.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool, so a bit over 6,000 square feet for this apartment. How many bedrooms and bathrooms?

SERENA: We have a total of four plus one bedrooms, four plus one bathrooms. And you have a wet and dry kitchen, which we’ll show you in a bit. You have several massive balconies and this unbeatable sea view, which is unobstructed, totally unobstructed.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. Okay, so the price tag is a bit under $1.1 million, but I want people to look at this not simply as a potential purchase, but also if you just want to rent it, right? There’s always the possibility of buying the cheaper units for $140,000 for the MM2H and then renting a place like this. How much would the rent be?

SERENA: About RM 10,000, RM 12,000 per month at this moment.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool, so $2,300, $2,500 per month to rent a just massive place like this. Front line. Yeah, the view is absolutely stunning. What would be the closing cost be for a place like this?

SERENA: Approximately, 10% of the property price. And properties here, when they are for sale, they’re generally negotiable to about 10% to 20% from their asking. But it depends on which owner it is and which properties as well.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Okay, so this is not for this unit, in general. It’s just the market?

SERENA: Yes.

LADISLAS MAURICE: 10% to 20%, that’s quite a lot. Typically, in a lot of markets in the world, 5% is pretty standard, etc., but here it’s more.

SERENA: Yeah, it really depends. But yeah, we have cases where we negotiate quite a fair bit, but generally, I would say stick around 10%.

LADISLAS MAURICE: The beach is public, though, but the access is private.

SERENA: Yeah, all the beaches here, they are public, but every building has its own private access to the beach. If you don’t own a building by the beach, you still can access the beach. It’s just a matter of where you go in. But if you invest in a property like this, obviously, you can just walk straight onto the beach every day.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. What about the expenses per month? Because property management and all that, that’s the same as the other apartment in terms of percentages. What about the HOA, property tax, etc., how much per month, roughly?

SERENA: The management fee is a bit higher, though, because the size is big, so we’re talking about less than RM 2,000 per month. And when you’re talking about expenses in terms of maintaining the property, I would say it’s probably not more than RM 9,000 a year, but it really depends. And also, when it comes to taxes, probably below RM 500 per half a year.

LADISLAS MAURICE: And that’s included in the numbers for all the monthly charges. When you do the numbers, you end up, roughly, with a net rental yield of 1% before income tax. No one in their right mind would just buy this for rental income. It really is just a lifestyle purchase, it’s a tax product, and it’s a way to have money in a very different jurisdiction, which is quite stable as well. For people who don’t want to be all in the West, they can just buy something here. Generally speaking, it maintains its value, especially when it’s frontline.

Look, apartments like we saw at Tamarind right before, it’s a bit newer, it’s nice, nothing wrong with it, but it’s just inside, it’s not front line, and there’s a lot of space still to develop. This here is front line, good location, etc., it’s not going anywhere. I mean, the sea will be here for– [laughs]

SERENA: And it’s extremely low density, because you have only two units per floor. You don’t really see your neighbors, too, because only a single block.

Penang as a hub for global people

LADISLAS MAURICE: Can you tell us a little bit about Penang as a hub?

SERENA: Okay. We’re extremely well positioned. A lot of our clients that are not Malaysians, they opt to choose Penang as a hub, a place to live in, because of, obviously, the kind of space you can afford here at a minimal cost compared to regional countries. And also, we have a lot of direct flights to countries in our neighborhood, for instance, Singapore, Taipei, Hong Kong, and parts of China, Jakarta, and Bangkok.

LADISLAS MAURICE: And Vietnam as well, right?

SERENA: Yeah, and Ho Chi Minh.

LADISLAS MAURICE: And multiple flights a day to Singapore, which is important because that’s really a hub, so it’s pretty well connected. I have to say, Penang Airport is a bit underwhelming. It’s really looking old.

SERENA: They’re upgrading. [laughs]

LADISLAS MAURICE: Cool. It’s needed, right? For now, it’s not great. After the upgrade, we’ll see.

SERENA: Okay, we’re entering the master suite, which features its own balcony, and a spotlight bathroom, and a walk-in wardrobe over here.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Wow. Wow. Okay, that is a big, big wardrobe. Cool. Yeah, this is very nice. Again, guys, when we’re looking at this, you can have this for $2,500 a month, by making a minimum investment of $250,000 in Malaysia to qualify for the MM2H, a bit in fixed deposits, which earn you interest, or you can put it in Islamic finance, if you’re Muslim, and a bit in real estate, and then you can just rent a place like this for $2,500 a month and not pay any taxes on foreign-earned income. This is how you should look at this apartment viewing. This literally could be your lifestyle. And it’s not an expensive lifestyle. Well, jacuzzi. Cool.

Compare where you’re from, what $2,500 a month gets you in rent, and then compare this lifestyle that you can get here. Combine it with amazing healthcare, education, weather, safety, etc. That’s pretty compelling. I understand why people are moving here. And you’re saying you have a lot of Australian clients, right?

SERENA: Yeah. In fact, the owners of this property, they’re Australians as well.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Okay, so Australians, Kiwis, so why them, particularly? Because you said you don’t have a lot of Americans, Canadians.

SERENA: I guess it’s because we’re close by as well, and it’s not really hard to hop on a couple of flights to go back home. And also, a lot of Australians, they are pilots working with Cathay, and a lot of them used to live in Hong Kong. For people from Hong Kong, whether you’re originally from there, they can relate to Penang very well, because we’re primarily Chinese over here, perhaps, and we’re an island, and you can live much better compared to living in Hong Kong, because just looking at the property prices is insane.

LADISLAS MAURICE: And if you’re wondering why we only have one microphone now, as opposed to two in the first apartment, we lost the second one. [laughs]

SERENA: I lost it.

Medical care in Malaysia for expats

LADISLAS MAURICE: Tell us a little bit more about healthcare here, because it’s one of the primary reasons people move here.

SERENA: Penang is also known as a medical hub. There are a lot of private hospitals, no long waiting lines. They’re affordable, they’re quality healthcare services. And the doctors are primarily trained in the US, and the UK, and Australia.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah. Look, I’ll give you an example. I had to take my daughter last minute to the doctor last week. We just show up, give the passport, we’re registered in under a minute, and then we got to see the doctor immediately. The doctor just checked her out. Everything was fine, no drama, no over-prescribing, no upselling, nothing. We just left with a little bag of vitamin C. And it cost us less than $9. Yeah, healthcare is pretty competitive here. And then also when you live here, and it’s something that I discussed with TG, he’s my MM2H agent here, one of the prime advantages of having residence here in Malaysia is you get access to Malaysian health insurance, which is really affordable and really covers you everywhere in the world. It’s very competitive.

Cool. The view of the city–

SERENA: You can actually see Tamarind from here.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Okay. That’s the one?

SERENA: The bunch there.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah, okay.

SERENA: Three bunch.

Differences between Penang and Langkawi

LADISLAS MAURICE: All right. I prefer the other view. That’s a bit less loud as well. But yeah, I just recently came back from Langkawi. It’s very different from Penang, lovely island. And you also help people secure property there, correct?

SERENA: Correct.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Can you give us just two words on the differences between Penang and Langkawi, and the type of people that prefer Langkawi over Penang and vice versa?

SERENA: We have some clients that have moved to Penang from Langkawi. They have opted for Langkawi simply because they love the relaxed atmosphere, the lifestyle elements, and all that. But eventually, they felt that they wanted a busier life, to be closer to more amenities, because Penang provides much more in terms of not just comfortable options, but we have much more in terms of healthcare options as well, or schools, or shopping.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Airport.

SERENA: Yeah. Then people that would want to have more fun choose to be in Penang. But there are some clients that would prefer to live quietly remotely, we would advise for them to perhaps consider Langkawi. But please note that, for Langkawi, a lot of real estate are Malay-reserved. It actually means foreigners or non-Malays cannot purchase them, okay? If that’s the case, you can’t purchase them as a non-Malay unless you’re a Malay person. But there are properties that are non-Malay-reserved and still freehold, typically, condominiums that are newly built or fairly new, you can probably consider that as well.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Yeah. Langkawi, look, the beaches are nicer than they are on Penang. It’s, like you say, really calm, but there’s barely any police on the island, which is really pleasant, extremely safe, very little police, very little CCTV. You’re just kind of left alone there. I found Langkawi very nice. But yeah, after a while, I’ll put it this way, I spent, like, a small week in Langkawi, I was happy to be back in Penang. Having said this, there are, like, $50 flights back and forth, so when you’re in Penang, you can just fly to Langkawi for a few days, come back, it’s a nothing burger. But both options are fine, but for 95% of people, Penang will generally be the better option. You can help, essentially, anyone purchase property here in Penang for residency or just for lifestyle, etc.?

How to get in touch with Serena

SERENA: All types of properties we cover. But of course, you can feel free to just drop us a line and we’ll help you out.

LADISLAS MAURICE: Perfect. Serena’s contact information is below. And also, if you want to find out more information on the MM2H program, how to get residency here, there’s a link with more information right below. All right. Serena, thank you very much for your time today.

SERENA: Thank you. It’s a pleasure.