Affordable housing remains a prevalent issue in the country. The definition suggests affordable housing as adequate housing in quality, location, and known as not so costly that prevents its occupants from meeting other essential living needs. In the effort of providing sufficient affordable housing, various affordable housing programs, namely Residensi Wilayah and PR1MA, are currently in the market with the aims to develop and deliver new affordable housing, which targeted the middle-and low-income group. Although the lacking of affordable housing persists, the severe glut in the property market has also records to reach an all-time high. The overhang crisis in the country became an infamous issue in the country with the slow market, which led to the increase in the overhang unit’s statistics year over a year which partially in affordable housing segmentation. It is highlighted that the overhang in affordable housing has shown significant rising despites of its strong demand. This paper attempts to examine the overhang issue in affordable housing in Malaysia and related factors. This research will add up some points of discussion as regards the impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic towards the issue of affordable housing and the strategies in reducing the overhang issue during the pandemic. A review of the past literature related to the topics was carried out and data derived from journals, reports, and websites were gathered and examined to establish the framework on this issue and to identify the overhang factors in affordable housing. The developers are urged to build houses that can cater to the demand of buyers in terms of the property type, location, and also price range. The overhang units did not attract the target market while the product mismatch is one of the contributing factors. Other related factors are affordability, high living costs, and stagnant income growth, cooling measures, financing, unsuitable location, accessibility, the lack of timely and accurate data of buyer’s preference including the shift in demand towards the better-quality project. A study on the overhang factors of affordable housing is needed to resolve the issue, or else, the overhang issue will be worsened and will create a lot of negative impacts in the future. At the end of the research, the list of the property overhang factors and its framework able to be identified and to be used as guidelines and references to the public.

Housing issue is one of the key challenges and has its social repercussions if not well managed. The numerous affordable housing programs have been introduced and intended to increase the supply of affordable housing. The programs are meant to alleviate the affordable housing issue in the country. Although the lacking units of affordable housing persists, the slow market trends have also led to an increase in overhang units. The number of property overhang partly in affordable housing units were reported increased continuously year over year and does not attract the target market nor able to cater the housing needs of the targeted house buyers. Industry players were of the opinion that the perceived slow demand in low cost housing units are mainly due to difficulty in securing financing, unsuitable location as well as a shift in demand towards better quality projects and other factors. The purpose of this study is to identify the current overhang scenario in affordable housing and factors that lead to the issues. There is a need to have an in-depth study in addressing the issues. Otherwise, the overhang will exert pressure on prices and rental in the market and gives impact in near future.