Dear Mrs Shirley Shire,
I just concluded a sale of an apartment to a foreigner. The following are my comments:-
1. Handover of the apartment is 3 days (or any agreed timeframe in the SPA) from the full payment of the Sale & Purchase Price.
2. Legal ownership is upon full payment of purchase price and upon obtaining consent from the developer (if no strata title is issued yet) or upon registration of your name on the strata title which ever is applicable.
3. Astro pay to view TV belongs to the previous owner and contractually cannot be transferred.It is better that you apply for your preferred new package to avoid disruption of service due to unpaid bills by the previous owner. For normal TV channels, no license fee is required.
4. The water (if individually metered) and electricity accounts have to be reapplied by the new owner at the respective utilities offices because the previous owner has the right to terminate those accounts and obtain their deposits back. If this happens before you made a fresh application then you will risk not having water and electricity supply. The new owner is required to sign a new contract and pay a new deposit with each utilities company. A copy of the SPA and the handover of vacant possession letter each from the lawyer is required as proof of transfer of ownership. You need to buy two RM10 revenue stamps (setem hasil)and sign the application form (contract) with a witness signature for the electric company (Tenaga Nasional Berhad). The electric company will deduct all unpaid bills by the previous owner from their deposit and if the deposit is not adequate to cover the unpaid bills they will request the new owner to pay up before the new account is activated. In this instance, you will need the previous owner to settle all unpaid bills.The same applies to unpaid water bills.
5. If the water bill (bulk metered)is issued by the joint management body or management corporation, you just need to update the new ownership with them
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