Forest City Review: Prices, Occupancy and How It Compares to Buying Near the RTS

What Forest City is

Forest City is a private township built by Country Garden Pacificview on reclaimed land off Gelang Patah, in the Iskandar Puteri area of south-west Johor. Country Garden, the Chinese developer, owns 60% of the joint venture and Esplanade Danga 88, an affiliate of the Johor state’s Kumpulan Prasarana Rakyat Johor, owns 40%. It sits right next to the Tuas Second Link, so from parts of the project you can see Tuas across the water.

The plan was first announced in 2006 and the project formally opened on 6 March 2016. After an environmental review cut the reclamation from 1,600 hectares to under 405 hectares, Country Garden divided it into four islands. Island 1 is the built-up one, with the condo towers, a shopping complex, hotels, a beach and the Forest City Golf Resort. The original target was a city of 700,000 people.

Occupancy and the “ghost city” reports

Forest City is far emptier than planned, and that is the main reason it gets called a ghost city. Foreign Policy reported as few as 500 residents in 2019, after about 15,000 units had been sold. By June 2023 the long-term population was put at 8,000 to 9,000. A 2024 Domus piece cited estimates that just over 1% of the planned total was occupied and about 15% of the project had been built. Neither Country Garden nor the management company publishes an official occupancy rate, so treat every percentage you read as an estimate.

Sales fell by more than 90% after March 2020, and Country Garden cut its headcount on the project by about two-thirds in 2021. Many of the units that were sold have stayed empty.

The picture is not all bleak. The developer reports about 4 million coastal visitors, more than 100,000 golfers and over 260,000 hotel guests in 2025. Those are the developer’s own numbers in a press release, and visitors are different from residents, but weekends there are busier than the “ghost town” videos suggest.

Country Garden’s financial trouble

Country Garden is still operating, but it went through one of the largest defaults in China’s property crisis. It deferred debt payments in August 2023, and by October 2023 it had triggered cross defaults on up to US$11 billion of offshore bonds. That raised fears that overseas assets like Forest City could be sold or seized by creditors.

The restructuring has since gone through. A Hong Kong court approved the roughly US$17.7 billion offshore debt plan on 4 December 2025, it took effect on 30 December 2025, and in February 2026 the court dismissed a petition to wind the company up. For a buyer, the practical risk is less about the company vanishing and more about how quickly it can fund new phases, maintenance and amenities on the remaining islands.

Special Financial Zone and duty-free island

In 2024 the Malaysian government gave Forest City two new labels to bring in business and visitors. On 20 September 2024 it announced incentives for the Forest City Special Financial Zone (SFZ). Qualifying single family offices with more than RM30 million in assets can get a 0% corporate tax rate for 10 years, some financial and fintech firms get 5%, and knowledge workers in the zone pay a flat 15% income tax.

Parliament passed five bills in July 2024 to make Island 1 a duty-free island, the fifth in Malaysia and the first you can drive to. Phase one started on 15 November 2024. Alcohol, chocolate, cosmetics and perfume are among the categories covered. Check Singapore Customs’ allowances before you drive home with a full boot.

Take-up of the SFZ has been gradual. Malay Mail reported the first two family offices in April 2025, and Forest City’s own July 2026 release says nine had approvals by June 2026. The same release says 593 people were approved under the SFZ category of the Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) programme between October 2024 and March 2026.

The JS-SEZ link

Forest City is part of the Johor–Singapore Special Economic Zone (JS-SEZ), the agreement Malaysia and Singapore signed in January 2025 to draw investment into southern Johor. The JS-SEZ is much bigger than Forest City, so the label alone does not set it apart from other parts of Johor. Its SFZ tax rates are the specific advantage, and they matter to companies and family offices more than to someone buying a two-bedder. Forest City’s July 2026 release cites Singapore’s trade ministry figure of more than S$5.5 billion in Singapore-linked commitments in Johor since the JS-SEZ was first agreed, which is a Johor-wide number and not Forest City’s.

Resale prices and rents today

Resale asking prices in Forest City are a fraction of launch prices. On 12 October 2026, Mudah had 25 Forest City apartments for sale. Most were two-bedders of 517 to 980 sq ft asking RM228,000 to RM430,000, with a 1,378 sq ft sea-view three-bedder at RM568,000. A 517 sq ft unit at RM250,000 to RM270,000 works out to roughly RM480 to RM520 psf. Home & Decor reported launch pricing from about RM1,200 psf.

Rentals are plentiful and cheap. The same day a Mudah search for “forest city” returned 266 rental listings, ten times the number of units for sale. Most 1 to 3 bedroom units asked RM1,000 to RM1,800 a month, with larger Cerulean Bay and Carnelian Tower units at RM2,000 to RM3,200. These are asking prices from listings, not transactions, and they move. A big pool of listings next to a small pool of tenants usually means landlords compete on price and wait longer between tenants.

Can a Singaporean buy here

Probably not on the resale market, at these prices. Almost every resale unit we found asks under RM1 million, and Johor’s general floor for foreign buyers is RM1 million. A separate route exists: under the Forest City SFZ track of MM2H, qualifying purchases from the developer reportedly start at RM500,000. A July 2026 guide also describes a 50% stamp duty remission for individuals buying completed units directly from the developer, with sales and purchase agreements signed between 1 September 2024 and 31 December 2034. Subsales are outside that remission. These details come from secondary reporting, so confirm them with a Malaysian lawyer before you commit. The general rules, including the 8% stamp duty for foreigners and the 3% Johor levy, are in our guide to buying property in JB as a Singaporean.

Getting there from Singapore

Forest City is reached through the Tuas Second Link, not the Causeway. By car, the developer quotes about 40 minutes from the Singapore CBD and about 30 minutes to the JB city centre, before any checkpoint queue.

By public transport, take a Causeway Link bus (CW3, CW4, CW4S, CW6 or CW7) from Tuas Link, Boon Lay or Jurong East to the Sultan Abu Bakar CIQ complex at the Second Link, then change for free to the FC1 bus. The FC1 leg takes about 20 minutes. Causeway Link lists fares of S$4.50 from Tuas Link and S$5 from Boon Lay or Jurong East. Land Transport Guru, updated in May 2026, shows FC1 running from 5am to 10pm from Forest City, every 30 minutes at peak and hourly in between, but the operator’s own page shows shorter hours, so check the timetable on the day.

Forest City is a long way from the RTS Link. The RTS runs from Bukit Chagar in the JB city centre to Woodlands North, on the far side of JB. Living in Forest City and commuting by RTS would mean a 30-minute drive across JB before you even reach the station. For how the RTS works, see our RTS Link guide.

Forest City versus buying near Bukit Chagar RTS

The two options suit different buyers. Forest City is cheap per square foot with low rents and a weekend-resort feel. A condo near Bukit Chagar costs far more, but it sits a short walk from a train that reaches Singapore in about five minutes, which is what working tenants pay for. We used Twin Tower Residence, about 850 m from the station, as the Bukit Chagar example because it is completed and has live listings.

Using these asking figures, a Forest City two-bedder at RM268,000 renting for RM1,200 grosses about 5.4% a year, while a Twin Tower two-bedder at RM1,060,000 renting for RM3,300 grosses about 3.7%. The Forest City figure looks better on paper, but it assumes you find a tenant quickly in a market with ten rental listings for every sale listing, and that you can sell later in a market where most buyers will be Malaysians. Near Bukit Chagar, demand from people working in Singapore should rise once the RTS opens, though that is a forecast and not yet proven by rents. Run both through our cost calculator before you decide.

If a commute to Singapore is the point of buying in JB, start with our list of condos near Bukit Chagar RTS. Forest City makes more sense for a cheap holiday base, a Tuas-side worker, or someone using the MM2H SFZ route, and in each case go in expecting a quiet neighbourhood.

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