How much it costs to live in $100 billion 'ghost city' with less than 5,000 residents
Forest City was meant to be one of Malaysia's most enticing projects, yet in the 20 years since it was first conceived it has turned into a ghost town, with just 5,000 residents staying there despite initial projections estimating a population of around 700,000.
Named 'Forest City', this soon-to-be ghost town was opened in March 2016 – a decade after planning began – yet things quickly went south as a number of notable factors – including currency controls from the Chinese government, the Malaysian political crisis at the start of this decade, and the COVID-19 pandemic – all saw sales fall significantly short of projections.
While the options to actually purchase an apartment are relatively limited depending where you look on the web, the prices themselves fall likely far below what you'd expect from the quality, with many hovering around the $100,000 mark for a one to two-bed luxury apartment.
Why did Forest City fail?
Key to understanding the colossal failure of Forest City is realizing its intended audience, as while it borders the southwestern section of the Johor Bahru District – the second largest of its kind in the entirety of Malaysia when considering population – it wasn't actually meant for local citizens.
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Instead, it was marketed towards wealthy and upper-middle-class people from China who wanted to move their money out of the country, with significant investment from Chinese developer Country Garden pushing this under the Belt and Road Initiative.
The conflagration of the aforementioned factors made it a perfect storm for failure, leading the immense promise and utopian vision of Forest City to fall apart, and giving it the 'ghost town' status it has today.
How much it cost to live in Forest City?
Looking on PropertyGuru, the options are surprisingly appealing for a luxury apartment in Forest City — and it could be something that a select few might find ideal if noisy neighbors and disturbance around your home are bothering you.
An 893 square feet, two bedroom flat in Forest City, for example, will set you back RM 420,000 – approximately $103,900 – equating to RM 470.32 per square feet, which is around a quarter of the per-square-feet cost of an apartment in Kuala Lumpur according to data from Numbeo.
That's just one apartment too, as there are some that you can get for as cheap as 260,000 RM ($64,000), although the price-per-square-foot works out to be around the same when looking at the size.
Could things turn around for Forest City?
Considering its spectacular failure and worldwide infamy, it's difficult to see a scenario where Forest City would be rejuvenated enough to match the initial expectations, but the Malaysian government is working to improve its stature and make it appealing for people to live there.
In 2024, for example, the government designated Forest City the country's very first tax-free special financial zone, making it an incredibly appealing prospect for businesses, banking institutions, and financial services.
This not only populates the area and adds additional funding, but also provides job opportunities and services to those who want to live there, making it far more realistic that someone would be willing to put up with the sacrifices.
Part of the issue, however, remains with the sparse population, and unless that's fixed in a short period of time it's likely to continue as a sticking point for many prospective home owners.