MRED Speaker Series: Property Laws & Legislations

The Faculty of Accountancy and Management (FAM) Master of Real Estate Development (MRED) Programme organised the Guest Speaker Series on 27 June 2020. The webinar was held via Microsoft Teams. In this third series, invited as the speaker for the webinar was Dato' Pretam Singh Darshan Singh. Also present at the webinar was FAM Head of Programme for MBA (Building Management/Master of Real Estate Development) Dr Chin Hon Choong, lecturer Dr S. Sheelah and students.

Dato' Pretam Singh Darshan Singh

Dato’ Pretam started his sharing session titled, “Property Laws & Legislations” by introducing himself and sharing his background where he started as a watchman in 1974 and rose to be what he is today. Dato’ Pretam is the Partner of Pretam Singh, Nor & Co Advocates & Solicitors. Dato’ Pretam is the president of the Property Real Estate Lawyers Association. His practice is highly regarded and recognised by major developers and officially placed on the “Panel of Lawyers” of several developers, bankers, final institutions and GLCs. He also offers advisory services in housing development such as application of Housing Developer’s License, Advertising and Sales Permit, opening & operating of Housing Developers’ Account under Housing Developers (Project Account) Regulation 1991 and obtaining relevant exemption variations and waivers from the Ministry of Housing & Local Government. 

The Guest Speaker Series aimed to share informative and inspirational series of lectures to the students of MRED. These series provided an opportunity for students to experience real industrial requirement, experiences and development of the related fields, aside from enhancing students’ learning experience by providing current and relevant examples of the practical applications of the theory they learnt in a particular subject.   

Dato’ Pretam during the webinar

In the webinar, he spoke about the legislative history, housing corporation, saving and exemption, housing development account, legal issues, housing tribunal and other related topics. Aside from that, he also shared several case studies that came with practical application throughout the webinar.

He said, “The purpose of an act is to provide control and licensing of the business of housing development in Peninsular Malaysia and the protection of the interest of purchasers and for matters connected therewith. The housing legislation is principally aimed at protecting the interest of purchasers. There are circumstances where the nature and purpose of a particular legislation must be considered when construing its various provisions so as not to defeat the intention of Parliament.”  

“Every legal power must have legal limits, otherwise there will be a dictatorship. In other words, every discretion cannot be free from legal restraint; where it is wrongly exercised, it becomes a duty of the courts to intervene,” added Dato’ Pretam. He also explained the “housing accommodation” under the Housing Development Act which includes any building, tenement or messuage which is wholly or principally constructed, intended for human habitation or partly for human habitation and partly for business premises and such other type of accommodation prescribed under the section 3A to be housing accommodation.

Dato’ Pretam elucidated that, “Housing Development means to develop or construct or cause to be constructed in any manner more than four units of housing accommodation and it includes the collection of money or carrying on any building operations for the purpose of erecting housing accommodation in, on, under or over any land.”

The webinar was followed by a Q&A session before it adjourned.

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