KUALA LUMPUR (April 1): The Edge weekly in its latest edition said it may be time to begin relaxing some of the cooling measures imposed on the residential property sector as they have achieved a certain degree of success, an analysis of the latest housing and financial indicators by The Edge shows.

In its cover story, the Edge Team wrote that prolonging them may have an unintended consequence — depriving Malaysians of the chance to own a home. This is because house prices are unlikely to fall and, indeed, will continue to rise, albeit at a more moderate pace than that seen from 2010 to 2014.

The weekly said most of the cooling measures were implemented in 2014 and aimed at clamping down on excessive speculation and runaway property prices that were threatening to turn into a bubble. These were necessary then to safeguard domestic financial stability.

This article puts forward the argument that these measures have, by and large, served their purpose and that a partial relaxation is now timely.

However, the magazine said before that, it is necessary to look at the circumstances that led to these cooling measures in the first place.

It said the 2007/08 global financial crisis (GFC), considered to be the worst since the Great Depression, began with the bursting of the property bubble and subsequent subprime mortgage crisis in the US.

Exacerbated by the financial engineering (read: excessive risk-taking) that had gone on unchecked for far too long, the US subprime mortgage crisis ballooned into a full-blown international banking disaster and resulted in the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008, said the Edge.

It said the Lehman bankruptcy, the largest in US history, was a seminal event, triggering massive losses in equity markets and, more importantly, further erosion of confidence in the global financial system.

The contagion spread quickly through the financial markets, resulting in a liquidity crunch worldwide and, eventually, the European banking and sovereign debt crisis in 2009.

Faced with the prospect of a global financial market meltdown, it was left to central bankers to shore up flagging confidence. What the world saw in the ensuing years was a slew of bank bailouts and unorthodox monetary policies.

On what are the measures that could be taken to help Malaysians own a home, please read the Edge for week of April 3 – April 9 available at newsstands now.

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