Implications of IM development: Johor as an increasingly viable

What then are the implications of the IM region’s rapid development and how can we relate this to the subject of this dissertation? For one, such improvements in infrastructure means that Singaporeans¹⁶ would be able to take advantage of IM’s increasing living and service standards at a fraction of the usual cost. Singaporeans’ confidence with regards to IM has probably increased with more Singaporeans and expatriates from Singapore buying homes in IM’s prime property locations such as Ledang Heights, Bukit Indah, Horizon Hills and the prestigious Leisure Farm resort¹⁷ (Navaratnarajah 2012). The Johor Singapore Comcare Association¹⁸ (henceforth known as JSCA), an organization supported by the Malaysian and Singapore government explains that there are approximately 5,000 Singaporean families registered with them and living permanently in Johor (Navaratnarajah 2012)¹⁹. JSCA claims that a majority of them are middle aged couples who pass through the border on a daily basis to work and go to school while roughly 20% of those registered are elderly retirees. Channel News Asia documentary ‘Get Real’ also highlights the increasing number of

16 Singaporeans accounted for 54% of tourist arrivals in Malaysia in 2011 and this figure excludes Singapore’s expatriate community who frequent Johor Bahru (Abdullah 2012).

17 Prices of homes range between RM500,000 (S$198,000) for a terrace house to RM1 million (S$397,800) for a semi-detached house.

18 The JSCA is a transborder/transnational organization that is supported by both the Singapore and Malaysia government. It was founded in 2012 by a group of Singaporeans who live in Johor Bahru. Run by volunteers, the JSCA aims to provide services and information to Singaporeans who live or are planning to live in Johor. The JSCA also looks to establish networks with businesses in Malaysia in order to provide benefits for its registered members.

19 The JSCA acknowledges through the interviews with the researcher that there might be other Singaporeans living in Johor who have not registered with them.

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young Singaporean families, retired couples and even middle aged ‘pre-retirees’ who look to secure houses in Johor for their retirement (Ser 2013).

With the IM region morphing into a modern metropolis of considerable stature²⁰, it should come as no surprise that Singaporeans, especially those from the middle income, would consider living or even retiring in Malaysia as suggested by Jones (20081). Such a phenomenon of cross border retirement migration is already occurring in Hong Kong, where some retirees, particularly those without adequate retirement protection plans, move to mainland China due to perceived cost advantages and a compatible environment²¹ (Chou 2007). The study also predicted the phenomenon to intensify as Hong Kong prepares to accommodate a swelling ageing population. Based on the patterns aforementioned, we can expect a similar trend of retirement migration to Johor in time to come.

There is however a very significant consideration when examining the Johor retirement migration phenomenon – a foreigner can own a home in Johor and anywhere else in Malaysia provided it costs at least RM 500,000 (approximately SGD$200,000 at the time of writing). This amount has been steadily increasing from RM 250,000 to the current rate and a few property agents I spoke to in Johor mentioned that the Malaysian government are

20 The implications of tourism and IRM on a particular locale have been examined by Zasada et al. (2010). The authors found that other than resulting in social and political changes such as through the formation of organizations and the establishment of policies to accomodate/reject migrants, the impact of IRM also extends to

environmental change, especially when space earmarked for traditional forms of

economic practice such as agriculture becomes marginalized through urban expansion.

The same could not really be said for the case of the development of the IR region though, as the state held the intention of pulling retirees into Johor and other parts of Malaysia for that matter what with its elaborate 'Malaysia my second home program' and the extent of urbanization through infrastructural development.

21 Although 6.7% the respondents in Chou’s (2007) study expressed interest in moving to mainland China to retire, they also stated that they would still return to Hong Kong for family visits and receive public health care services.

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contemplating increasing the minimum property price for foreigners to RM 1 million. The increase in minimum prices belies an economically driven motive on the part of the Malaysian government, where only those who would be able to contribute to the local economy via expenditure, capital or consumption would be welcome to stay²².

The process of getting a home in Malaysia isn’t a cakewalk either.

There is a plethora of legal – administrative documentation involved, along with various fees that one would incur in the process. As attractive as it may seem then, purchasing a house in Johor presents certain barriers that not all would be able to overcome. It is quite true that organizations such as the JSCA have established information portals and online support networks that would facilitate such a process. The online platform through which the JSCA primarily conducts itself however²³, can be considered exclusive due to the simple fact that very few from the population of Singaporean elderly Malay retirees aged 60 and above have a good grasp of computers or the internet for that matter. For elderly retirees who are not able to negotiate the high tech barriers or fork out at least RM500,000²⁴ to retire comfortably in Johor’s IM region, there are other ways through which this can be done. This is

22 This rather instrumental approach to receiving migrants in Malaysia is also made clear when we examine the Malaysia My Second Home programme where foreigners intending to stay in Malaysia are required to deposit a substantial sum of money in the national bank; RM500,000 for individuals below 50 and RM150,000 for those above 50 according to the ‘Malaysia My second Home Webpage’.

23 I had interviewed the secretary general of the JSCA to find out more about the organization, namely how it operates as well as its objectives.

24 We have established through studies discussed earlier that a large

proportion of the elderly would have almost depleted their retirement funds through other uses by the time they are of retirement age or perhaps, did not have more than required of the minimum sum for withdrawal. In most cases, the elderly couples or individual would have to downgrade their

homes to smaller or rented apartments in order to squeeze some money out of the transaction that can be used for retirement.

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where Kampung Makmur as an alternative retirement destination becomes the focus of this thesis.