PUTRAJAYA: Both the Real Estate and Housing Developers Association (Rehda) and House Buyers Association lauded the Government’s approval of the build-and-sell concept.  

Under the concept, house buyers pay 10% of the house cost when they sign up for it and the remaining 90% only when the house is ready. 

Rehda president Datuk Jeffrey Ng said this concept parallels the existing progressive payment scheme and this was good as both approaches balanced the needs of the nation and house buyers. 

Ng: ‘The Government has heeded our feedback’

Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak announced on Thursday that the National Council for Local Government had approved in principle the build-and-sell concept whereby buyers paid an initial 10% deposit for a house and the balance only when it was completed.  

Ng said the association had always maintained that the introduction of the build-and-sell concept or any variant be market driven and be allowed to co-exist with the current progressive payment scheme. 

“We are glad the Government has heeded our feedback to allow the new and existing systems to co-exist,” he said in a statement here yesterday. 

Chang: ‘There should be a fast track approval system’

Ng, however, suggested that under the new concept, banks and financial institutions play a more vital role to ensure that projects under the new 10:90 scheme were adequately funded.  

House Buyers Association secretary-general Chang Kim Loong praised the Cabinet, especially Housing and Local Government Minister Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting, for having the courage and wisdom to implement the concept, which he described as a balanced decision. 

He said it was a good system that would protect house buyers and reduce the number of projects being abandoned.  

Chang also said there was a need for mechanisms to encourage housing developers to comply with the 10:90 concept.  

“I suggest that the Government set up a fast track approval system for developers to begin a housing project, to be managed by a special committee,” he said when contacted in Petaling Jaya yesterday.  

This, he said, would encourage the developers to comply with the concept. 

Group managing director of SP Setia Bhd Tan Sri Liew Kee Sin said in a statement that the system provided buyers with a choice either to buy properties built under the old sell-and-build system or the new build-and-sell system.  

Sarawak Housing Minister Datuk Abang Johari Tun Abang Openg said the state would study the viability of the build-and-sell concept before implementing it, and that it was not compulsory for the state to implement the concept. 

“If we feel that the concept is viable, we will implement it together with the existing system,” he told reporters after launching the state-level golden jubilee celebration of Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka in Kuching yesterday.