Racist Rentals, the latest documentary by the R.AGE – The Star’s youth news and lifestyle platform, revealed that racial discrimination exists in the Malaysian property market.
In the documentary, three R.AGE journalists of different races called the same 30 property listings.
Almost 50 percent of the homeowners or agents rejected them due to their race. The rejection came after the journalists made a phone call for a viewing, and not to meet the owners, make an offer or have an interview, reported The Star.
Response to the online documentary was swift. In less than 24 hours, a Facebook post attracted more than 260 comments, most of which come from renters who experienced similar discrimination.
Facebook user Dhibeshiny K. Jaya Raman said she was “rejected by a landlord because apparently Indian cooking stinks”.
“Not a banana leaf lover, I guess. Another landlord said it’s okay even if I had a pet dog, but said no after meeting me, saying his other tenants wouldn’t want an Indian. Right to my face,” she shared.
This implies that pets are okay, but not certain races.
Several foreigners living in the country said they were surprised to find that racial filtering was openly practised in Malaysia.
“As an Indonesian, I struggled when I first got here. I guess I could’ve just indulged the landlords and pretended to be Malay, but that would be wrong,” explained another user Ari Vanuaranu.
Racism is widespread in Malaysia, said various real estate agents. Agents are instructed by landlords to immediately reject prospective tenants of certain nationalities or races since based on experience, said groups tend to be bad tenants.
Meanwhile, most landlords interviewed for the project claim that it is not about race, but more about protecting their investment or simply looking for suitable tenants based on their own preferences.
However, one landlord, who refuse to be identified, revealed that “stereotypes generally hold some weight”.
Unlike other races, he believes that Indian nationals, for instance, do not take care of their rented properties since they are used to having maids back home.
In concurring, several other tenants explained that their bad experiences with tenants of certain races led them to applying blanket bans on such races.
Former president of the Malaysian Institute of Estate Agents Siva Shanker said that while he disagrees with the practice, agents have no choice but to follow the instruction of the landlords.
Countries such as Singapore, Australia and the United States have anti-discrimination laws, while Malaysia does not have, noted Siva, who is also a real estate agent.
“Sometimes the agents lie, because it breaks our heart to tell the potential tenant the truth, so we say, ‘oh, the unit has already been taken’.”
Image sourced from The Coverage
Radin Ghazali, Content Writer at PropertyGuru, edited this story. To contact her about this or other stories email radin@propertyguru.com.my
For more information on new homes, check out PropertyGuru’s New Property Launches and Project Reviews.
