Firdaus: The Malaysian projects never failed to impress our overseas guests when they were brought to visit these award-winning projects.
PETALING JAYA: The International Real Estate Federation (FIABCI) Malaysia is hopeful that the property sector will start seeing significant improvements in 2023.
Coming off of the pandemic, FIABCI Malaysia president Datuk Firdaus Musa said the property market has been seeing some improvements already, this year.
“Based on the latest statistics released by the National Property Information Centre, property market activity recorded better performance in the first half of 2022.
“More than 188,000 transactions were recorded worth RM84.40bil, showing an increase of more than 30% in volume and value compared to the same period last year, as all property sectors recorded year-on-year growth,” he told StarBiz.
Firdaus said the overhang situation also showed improvement with a significant decline of 7.5% and 4.6% in volume and value respectively, to 34,092 units worth RM21.73bil.
“Although house prices continued their slow pace of growth, the office and retail sectors remained unchanged.
“However, in the third and through the fourth quarters, the residential market showed slower activity due to the increase in the overnight policy rate, resulting in lower take up rates of new and completed projects.”
Still, Firdaus said the movement of office and retail activities showed a sudden surge in office and retail requirements, amidst the expectation of a new government and the positive outlook of the economy based on exports activities.
“Going into 2023, I hope that there would be new economic policies, the foreign direct investments influx and a fresher and investor friendly approach that should be able to kick-start real estate activities, especially in new and more dynamic development projects.”
Firdaus was elected FIABCI Malaysia president in August.
He was previously the honorary treasurer of FIABCI Malaysia and succeeded property market veteran, Datuk Seri Koe Peng Kang.
Firdaus is the founder and group managing director of Firdaus and Associates, which is a registered valuation, real estate agency and property management firm.
Firdaus said he is committed to ensuring the relevancy of FIABCI Malaysia in the real estate sector and the fraternity.
He emphasised that this would be done by having constant dialogues together with the association’s principal members, the government and stakeholders on issues pertaining to real estate.
“A few initiatives have been planned to further strengthen FIABCI Malaysia, to be the leading voice hand in hand, together with our principal members on real estate and a real estate body to be recognised by all in the industry.
FIABCI is a worldwide network, with its membership open to all professionals involved in the property industry.
Its chapters currently operate in 60 countries.
With 120 professional organisations and 3,500 individual professionals, its combined membership is over 1.5 million.
Every real estate discipline is represented within FIABCI and its operations are spread over four principal regions, namely Africa, the Americas, Asia Pacific and Europe.
FIABCI Malaysia conducts events such as study tours and organises the prestigious Malaysia Property Award and FIABCI World Prix d’Excellence Awards, which recognises property developments both in Malaysia and abroad.
Firdaus said the winners for the awards have always been outstanding in their winning projects, adding that it is hard to name one or a few that stands out.
“This is as they are all equally outstanding in their own merit. However, the projects with people, technology and environment in mind are the ones that I consider the most that stand out more than the rest.
“With the paradigm shift in the market trend, consumers’ behavioural patterns and the after effects from the pandemic, developers are faced with new challenges to develop more sustainable and future-proofing projects.”
In terms of standards, Firdaus said Malaysian development projects are either on par, if not better, when compared to similar overseas development projects.
“These are especially the ones that have won the FIABCI World Prix d’Excellence Awards each year.
“From the experience of our FIABCI awards questionnaires, our Malaysian developers do realise the international criteria that gives a benchmark on the quality of their projects.
Firdaus said Malaysian developers are constantly learning and improving in terms of technological advancement, architectural designs, construction methods, environment preservation and social integration.
“The Malaysian projects never failed to impress our overseas guests when they were brought to visit these award-winning projects.
“Nevertheless, I would encourage our developers to gain knowledge from the outstanding award winning projects abroad where they can adopt or complement in their future projects, giving a fresher outlook on the built environment for Malaysia.”
Firdaus said that sustainability has become a major concern amidst rapid urbanisation in the country, adding that Malaysia may still be in the infant stage when it comes to embracing environmental, social and governance (ESG). “Nevertheless, in FIABCI, we have always looked into the importance of environmental impact in the projects evaluated with some emphasis in the operation and management of the projects and social impact and responsibility.
“As these previous values transformed into more structured guidelines, it has become an international-wide recognition as the ESG requirements.
“Therefore, it is crucial for all to have some ESG recognition in all their aspects of business operations to maintain competitiveness in the market and as an important value driver for the industry.”
Firdaus pointed out that sustainable buildings are not new issues being contemplated by the real estate industry.
“The issue under consideration is to what extent the requirements are being put forward and accepted.”
