Johor Property Overhang: Why High-Rise Units Are Still the Main Problem

Johor’s property overhang has been falling, but that does not mean the problem has disappeared.

Walk around Johor Bahru today and the picture can look quite different from the “property oversupply” headlines. New projects are still being launched, demand around the RTS corridor is attracting attention, and Johor continues to benefit from the Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone (JS-SEZ).

At the same time, a large amount of completed and incoming high-rise stock is still competing for buyers and tenants.

So, is Johor finally working through its property overhang, or are we heading towards an oversupply?

1. Johor’s overhang is heavily concentrated in high-rise property

The first thing to understand is that Johor’s overhang is not evenly spread across all property types.

In Olive Tree Property Consultants’ Johor Bahru Housing Property Monitor for 4Q2025, Johor had 10,560 unsold high-rise units compared with 825 landed homes. That means 93% of it is high rise development. cited in the report.

This is consistent with the wider market picture as NAPIC’s H1 2026 data shows that Johor had the highest number of completed unsold properties in Malaysia, with 4,222 completed unsold residential units and another 9,946 completed unsold serviced apartments. Serviced apartments are classified separately from residential property under commercial property statistics.

For Johor, most of the unsold property is pointing towards high-rise and serviced apartment stock, particularly in and around Johor Bahru near to RTS.

2. The RM500,000-plus segment is where the pressure becomes more obvious

The problem is not simply the number of units. It is also the price point.

For completed unsold serviced apartments nationwide in H1 2026, 55.2% were priced between RM500,001 and RM1 million, while another significant portion was priced above RM1 million. More than 70% had also been launched between six and 10 years earlier. Meaning this properties

That is why an overhang problem can persist even when overall property demand is still healthy due to the mismatch of product and demand.

However, there are genuine reasons for optimism around Johor Bahru.

The RTS Link will connect Bukit Chagar with Woodlands North, with a planned journey time of about six minutes and capacity of up to 10,000 passengers per hour in each direction. The project is now in its final stages, with operations expected in 2027.

The JS-SEZ also provides a longer-term economic story. The Malaysian and Singapore governments are targeting 50 projects in the first five years and 100 projects over 10 years, with an intended focus on sectors such as manufacturing, digital economy, logistics, healthcare, energy and business services.

These developments can support property demand by creating:

1. more employment;
2. more cross-border movement;
3. greater rental demand from Singapore-linked workers and businesses;
4. stronger demand around well-connected locations; and
5. greater investor interest in selected parts of Johor.

There is already evidence that infrastructure expectations are influencing demand. The state government said the number of unsold properties had fallen from around 13,000 to below 10,000 in recent years, while noting that most of the remaining unsold properties were high-rise. The same report highlighted stronger demand for properties near the future RTS Link.

3. The bigger concern is what is still coming?

This is where Johor’s property story becomes more complicated.

Olive Tree’s 4Q2025 monitor identified 70,177 future high-rise units compared with 38,448 landed homes, giving a 65:35 split in future supply. It also estimated around 60,000 high-rise units in the Johor Bahru core that were either recently completed, under construction or in the pipeline.

The problem is, Johor does not only have an existing overhang problem. It also has to manage the amount of new supply entering the market. If future developments continue to concentrate on compact serviced apartments and high-rise units aimed at the same buyer and tenant pool, today’s overhang could simply be replaced by another round of unsold inventory.

Practical Takeaway

Johor’s property overhang is improving in some areas, but the underlying high-rise supply issue has not disappeared.

The RTS Link and JS-SEZ can create genuine additional demand, particularly around locations that are directly connected to employment, transport and Singapore-related activity. But they cannot guarantee that every high-rise project will be absorbed.

For buyers and investors, the more useful approach is therefore to look beyond the headline “Johor property overhang is falling”. Johor may well continue to benefit from stronger economic integration with Singapore. But the next phase should be moving in the direction of building the right product, at the right price, in the right location.

That is ultimately how Johor works through its overhang.

Hafiz Noor