Under earlier versions of MM2H, buying property was optional. Plenty of participants rented for years and never bought.
That is over. Every tier now requires you to purchase and own a residence after approval — and once you have bought it, you cannot sell it for a decade.
Most coverage stops at the minimum prices. The prices are the easy part. What follows is the whole commitment, including the tax position that turns a ten-year restriction into something more consequential than it first appears.
1. The minimums
| Tier | Minimum property value | Where |
|---|---|---|
| SEZ / SFZ | Floor price subject to Johor state policy* | Forest City, Johor only |
| Silver | RM 600,000 | Anywhere in Malaysia |
| Gold | RM 1,000,000 | Anywhere in Malaysia |
| Platinum | RM 2,000,000 | Anywhere in Malaysia |
* MOTAC does not publish a ringgit figure for the SEZ tier. Its wording is that the purchase must be a “property/house in Forest City, Johor”, with the floor price “subject to Johor state property acquisition policy”. Figures circulating online come from the developer’s own guidance, not from MOTAC. Treat them accordingly and confirm before you commit — see the Forest City rules in detail.
The purchase is compulsory and it happens after approval as an MM2H participant, not before. You do not buy your way in; you are admitted and then obliged to buy.
2. The state threshold is a second, separate floor
This is the part that catches people, and it is not MOTAC’s rule at all.
Foreign purchase of Malaysian property is governed by state authority under the National Land Code, and each state sets its own minimum purchase price for foreign buyers, along with a consent process for the transfer — see Property thresholds per State.
That means there are two floors, and you must clear the higher of them:
- The MM2H tier minimum set by MOTAC — RM 600,000 at Silver, for example
- The state threshold for foreign buyers where the property sits
These are not the same number, and in several states the foreign-buyer threshold sits above the Silver minimum. A property that satisfies MOTAC may still be one a foreigner cannot buy in that state. Thresholds also differ by property type and have been revised repeatedly.
We are deliberately not publishing a table of state thresholds here. They change, they vary by category of property, and a stale table is worse than none — which is precisely why so much of the advice online is wrong. Confirm the current threshold for your specific state and property type with a Malaysian conveyancing lawyer before you sign anything. State consent is a real process with a real timeline, not a formality.
3. You cannot sell for ten years
MOTAC states it in the same words on every tier page:
Selling of the residence is not allowed for 10 years. However, the house can be upgraded (buying of a new residence) to a residence of higher value from the current property.
One prohibition, one exception.
The exception is narrower than it sounds. It permits an upgrade — buying a residence of higher value than the current one. It does not permit selling and renting. It does not permit selling and leaving your capital elsewhere. It does not permit downsizing.
And the consequence of getting this wrong is published, in plain terms: failure to comply with any of the terms results in the MM2H pass being revoked.
Treat the MM2H property requirement as a ten-year investment decision, not an administrative step. A change in your health, your family circumstances, the Malaysian property market or simply your plans does not release you from the holding period. Your residency is conditional on continuing to own the asset.
4. The tax nobody mentions
Now put the ten-year lock next to Malaysia’s Real Property Gains Tax, and the picture changes.
RPGT applies to gains on disposal of Malaysian property, under the Real Property Gains Tax Act 1976, administered by LHDN. The rates depend on how long you have held the property — and critically, on whether you are a citizen.
For foreign individuals the schedule is widely reported as:
| Holding period | Rate for foreign individuals |
|---|---|
| Years 1 to 5 | 30% — flat, no taper |
| Year 6 onward | 10% — permanent floor |
Two features of that schedule matter enormously to an MM2H participant.
There is no taper for foreigners in the first five years. A Malaysian citizen sees the rate step down year by year. A foreigner pays a flat 30% whether they sell in year one or year five.
The 10% never goes away. A Malaysian citizen who holds for six years pays nothing. A foreigner holding the same property for fifteen years still pays 10% on the gain. It is a permanent cost, not a timing question.
There is also a mechanical point worth budgeting for: on a disposal by a foreign seller, the buyer’s solicitor is required to retain a portion of the disposal price and remit it to LHDN pending assessment. Your sale proceeds do not all arrive on completion day.
5. The one piece of good news
Here is the analysis you will not find elsewhere, and it is genuinely favourable.
The ten-year MM2H lock outlasts the punitive RPGT band entirely.
The 30% rate applies to years one to five. The MM2H prohibition runs to year ten. By the time you are permitted to sell, you have been in the 10% band for five years already.
| Years 1–5 | Years 6–10 | Year 11 onward | |
|---|---|---|---|
| RPGT for foreigners | 30% | 10% | 10% |
| MM2H | Cannot sell | Cannot sell | May sell |
Put plainly: the restriction that looks like the programme’s harshest term also prevents you from ever selling at the worst possible tax rate. You could not have sold into the 30% band even if you had wanted to unless you decide to cancel your MM2H visa and leave Malaysia.
That does not make a ten-year illiquid holding a good idea for everyone. It does mean the two rules, read together, are less punishing than either looks alone — and anyone modelling an MM2H property purchase on the assumption they might exit at year three is modelling something the rules do not allow anyway.
6. What the fixed deposit does and does not cover
The 50% fixed-deposit withdrawal permitted after approval can be used for “purchasing a residence” among its four permitted purposes. So how much of the property does it fund?
| Tier | 50% of deposit | Property minimum | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Silver | ~USD 75,000 | RM 600,000 | roughly half still to find |
| Gold | ~USD 250,000 | RM 1,000,000 | covered |
| Platinum | ~USD 500,000 | RM 2,000,000 | covered |
At Silver, the withdrawal covers something in the region of half the minimum at prevailing rates. The rest comes from you. This is the most common budgeting error we see: applicants treat the deposit as the price of entry and the withdrawal as paying for the house, and at Silver it does neither.
Full detail on the mechanism is in how the fixed deposit withdrawal works.
7. Costs beyond the purchase price
The minimum is the minimum. Budget separately for:
- Stamp duty on the transfer, on the standard tiered scale, currently at 8% for foreigners but maybe less in Johor if buying Forest City unit under SEZ category
- Legal and conveyancing fees, plus the state consent application
- Loan documentation costs if you finance any part — and note that financing terms available to foreign buyers differ from those for citizens
- Annual quit rent and assessment
- Service charges and sinking fund on any strata property, which on a condominium is a recurring cost for ten years minimum
- Maintenance and insurance across a decade
None of these are MM2H rules. All of them are part of the actual commitment, and a ten-year horizon multiplies the recurring ones.
8. Can you rent it out?
MOTAC requires you to purchase and own a residence. It does not require you to occupy it, and it does not restrict where in Malaysia you live — the pass is valid nationwide.
For the SEZ tier in particular this matters: the property must be in Forest City, Johor, but participants are not confined to Johor and may live in Kuala Lumpur, Penang or anywhere else. The property anchors the application, not your address.
Rental income arising in Malaysia is Malaysian-sourced income and is taxable in Malaysia. That is separate from the MM2H “tax exemption on incoming funds” and from the foreign-sourced income rules — three different things that get conflated constantly. Take advice specific to your position.
Who this suits, and who it does not
It suits you if you were going to buy in Malaysia regardless. For that applicant almost nothing has changed — the requirement simply formalises a decision already made, and the ten-year hold is not a constraint on someone planning to stay.
It does not suit you if you wanted to try Malaysia before committing capital, if you need the flexibility to release the asset within a decade, or if your plan depended on buying below the state foreign-buyer threshold.
For that second group the honest advice is to look at whether a different route fits better. Sarawak MM2H and PVIP have different property positions entirely — the 2026 restructure changed MM2H far more than it changed the alternatives.
Before you buy
Read this alongside the full MM2H requirements and the four MM2H tiers.
Three things we tell every client at this stage:
- Get independent property advice before choosing a tier, not after. The tier determines the size of a ten-year commitment, so the property decision should drive the tier choice rather than the reverse.
- Confirm the state foreign-buyer threshold and the consent process for your specific state and property type, with a Malaysian conveyancing lawyer, before you pay a deposit to any developer.
- Do not rely on a developer’s summary of MM2H eligibility. Developers sell property; they are not licensed to advise on the programme, and their marketing materials have been wrong about MM2H terms more than once.
Every application must be submitted through a MOTAC-licensed agent and processed via the One Stop Centre. Check any agent’s licence number against MOTAC’s published list before you pay anything. Ours is MM2H874.
We have handled MM2H applications since 2008, through four successive versions of the programme, and the compulsory property purchase is the change that has altered the most decisions. If you want to work through what it means for your circumstances, speak to a licensed consultant.
Sources: MOTAC — MM2H guidelines · Silver · Gold · Platinum · SEZ/SFZ · LHDN — Real Property Gains Tax
Property minimums, the ten-year restriction and the revocation consequence were checked against MOTAC’s published guidelines on 4 August 2026, which MOTAC last updated on 10 February 2026. RPGT rates and state foreign-ownership thresholds are set outside MOTAC and change; the RPGT figures given are those widely reported for foreign individuals and should be confirmed with LHDN or a qualified tax adviser. Ringgit equivalents of US dollar amounts are indicative. General information only — not legal, tax, property or investment advice.
