Malaysia’s My Second Home (MM2H) for years has been one of the most popular residence schemes in Asia. The scheme offers foreigners long term 1o year residence status equivalent to permanent residence status in Malaysia.
MM2H scheme was launched in 2002 to attract foreigners to come and stay in Malaysia for retirement, business and tourism. The special visa scheme is promoted by the Government of Malaysia to allow foreigners who fulfil certain criteria, to stay in Malaysia for as long as possible on a multiple-entry social visit pass.
Effective Feb 26 2019, new rules apply for MM2H scheme
- Main Applicants are required to obtain Letter of Good Conduct (LOGC) from the ORIGIN or Residence country
- Criminal record certificate from origin country
- Withdrawal of fixed deposit is no longer permitted to be submitted by e-mail from March 4, 2019.
- Sales agreement of property may be submitted in the name of dependant provided they are MM2H social pass holder
Applications will not be approved without these important documents.
The MM2H Centre, Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture (MOTAC) will no longer issued a supporting letter for the applicant to obtain the LOGC from the Hong Kong and Singapore authorities.
In 2018, a number of changes were made to this program
- Removal the reduction of Fixed Deposit placement based on property purchase worth RM1 million and above in Malaysia.
- Removal of the MM2H approval by government pension for MM2H applicants aged 50 years and above. All MM2H new participants must place Fixed Deposits to join this programme.
- Introduction of car tax incentives
- Compulsory notification of MM2h applicant death within 3 months
To receive social visit pass, applicants had to satisfy the following conditions
- Applicants aged below 50 years are required to show proof of liquid assets worth a minimum of RM 500,000 (USD 120,000) and offshore income of RM10,000 per month. Post approval RM 500,000 must be deposited in the bank and held for number of years of stay.
- Applicants aged 50 and above may comply with the financial proof of RM 350,000 (USD 85,000) in liquid assets and off shore income of RM10,000 per month. For government pensioners, they can show proof of receiving pension of at least RM 10,000 per month. Post approval fixed deposit of RM 150,000
The Social Visit Pass issued under this scheme is initially for a period of ten (10) years, and is renewable.
Currently there are 266 registered agents with MM2H authority offerings the MM2H program.
Last year Malaysia MM2H program received over 1 million applications contributed over RM 12.8 billion to economy. As of 2018, there has been over 42,000 approved participants
Chinese are the biggest applicants for the Malaysia MM2h scheme with 30.5% share, followed by Japanese and Bangladesh and UK/Ireland.
The ministry said last month MM2H programme is active and is still open for new applications.
Malaysia recently voted among top 5 best places to retire in the Annual Global Retirement Index
