Conveyancing
Conveyancing lawyers in Petaling Jaya, Selangor
Buying, selling or transferring property in Malaysia: the process, the paperwork, and when each payment falls due. Written for the buyer and the seller, step by step.
- Advocates & Solicitors, High Court of Malaya
- Damansara Utama, Petaling Jaya
- Conveyancing led by Queennie Tai
What kind of property matter is this?
Start with the situation closest to yours. Each one follows a different path.
Buying or selling a completed property
A sub-sale between two private parties: a house, an apartment or a shop lot with an individual or strata title already issued.
The steps, from offer to keysBuying from a developer
A new launch under the Housing Development Act, with a Schedule G or Schedule H agreement and a title that comes later.
Buying from a developerTransferring property within the family
A gift from a parent to a child, between spouses, or from a grandparent. Stamp duty relief may apply, and the conditions are strict.
Read about family transfersCorporate and project conveyancing
Land acquisition, developer sales documentation, master and strata title work, and redemption for companies and developers.
Corporate and project work
The steps, from offer letter to keys
A sub-sale purchase usually takes three to four months from the sale and purchase agreement to completion. This is what happens, in order.
Offer and earnest deposit
You sign an offer to purchase or booking form and pay an earnest deposit, usually held by the estate agent as stakeholder. A booking form is not the sale and purchase agreement. Read what happens to the deposit if the loan is refused before you sign it.
Earnest deposit. It forms part of the 10% deposit, so it is not an extra payment.
Appoint your solicitor
Your solicitor carries out a title search at the land office, checks for caveats, charges and restrictions, and confirms who the registered owner is. This is the point at which most problems are found.
Nothing new falls due at this step. The search fee is a disbursement billed with the agreement.
Sign the sale and purchase agreement
The agreement fixes the price, the completion period, the conditions and what happens on default. You pay the balance of the deposit on signing. Where the title carries a restriction in interest, the agreement is conditional on State Authority consent.
Balance of the 10% deposit. Your solicitor’s professional fee for the agreement, plus disbursements. Stamp duty on the agreement itself is nominal; the ad valorem duty falls on the transfer.
Loan documentation
If you are borrowing, the bank issues a letter of offer and its own panel solicitor prepares the loan agreement and charge. The bank’s solicitor acts for the bank. Your solicitor reads the letter of offer with you and checks that the loan conditions match the sale agreement.
The bank’s legal fee and the stamp duty on the loan agreement. A valuation fee if the bank requires a valuation report.
Stamping and consents
The transfer is submitted to LHDN for adjudication and stamped. If the title is restricted, the application for State Authority consent goes in now. If there is an existing charge, the seller’s bank issues a redemption statement and the discharge is prepared.
Stamp duty on the transfer, charged on the tiers in the Stamp Act 1949 and paid to LHDN. None of it is a fee to the firm.
Balance of the purchase price
Within the completion period, the balance is paid: your bank releases the loan, and you pay the difference. Part of the price may be retained by your solicitor for the seller’s real property gains tax, and part goes to redeem the seller’s loan.
The balance of the price, less the deposit already paid. Apportionment of quit rent, assessment and maintenance charges up to the completion date.
Registration at the land office
The transfer form, the discharge and the new charge are presented for registration. When the land office registers the transfer, the title is in your name. For a property still on the developer’s master title, this step is a deed of assignment now and a transfer later.
Registration fees, billed as disbursements.
Vacant possession
You receive the keys and take over the utility, assessment and management accounts. The final apportionments are settled between the solicitors.
Utility deposits and account transfers.
When do you actually pay? A timeline, not a total
A property purchase is billed in stages, not once. This is what falls due at each stage. For the amounts, use the calculator below; every figure there comes from the published scale and the Stamp Act.
| Stage | What falls due |
|---|---|
| Offer | Earnest deposit |
| Sale and purchase agreement | Balance of the 10% deposit · professional fee for the agreement · disbursements |
| Loan documentation | Bank’s legal fee · stamp duty on the loan agreement · valuation fee |
| Transfer | Stamp duty on the transfer, paid to LHDN · registration fees |
| Completion | Balance of the price · apportioned quit rent, assessment and maintenance charges |
| Later, developer purchases only | Perfection of transfer and perfection of charge when the strata or individual title is issued, often years after you move in |
For the figures at each stage: Legal Fees & Stamp Duty Calculator
Professional fee, disbursement, or tax: which is which?
A conveyancing bill has three parts, and they go to three different places. Most quotes that look wrong are three parts read as one.
- Professional fee
- The solicitor’s charge for the work. It follows the Solicitors’ Remuneration Order 2023 (P.U.(A) 207/2023), a published scale set by law, and a solicitor may not charge below it except where the Order itself allows.
- Disbursements
- Money the solicitor pays out on your behalf: land searches, registration fees, adjudication fees, bankruptcy searches, courier and stamping costs. They are estimated at the start and reconciled at the end.
- Stamp duty
- A tax paid to LHDN on the transfer and on the loan agreement, charged on the tiers in the Stamp Act 1949. Your solicitor collects and pays it. None of it reaches the firm.
Who pays for what
The buyer usually pays
- The professional fee and disbursements for the sale and purchase agreement
- Stamp duty on the transfer
- The bank’s legal fee and the stamp duty on the loan agreement
- The valuation fee, if the bank requires one
- Registration fees at the land office
The seller usually pays
- Their own solicitor, if they appoint one
- Real property gains tax on the sale, if any is due
- The redemption of any existing loan, from the sale proceeds
- Quit rent, assessment and maintenance charges up to completion
- The estate agent’s commission, by the usual arrangement
The buyer’s solicitor retains part of the price at completion and pays it to LHDN on account of the seller’s real property gains tax, as the Real Property Gains Tax Act 1976 requires. The percentage depends on whether the seller is a Malaysian citizen.
“Usually” means by convention. The sale and purchase agreement decides, and the parties can agree otherwise.
First-home stamp duty exemption
A Malaysian citizen buying a first residential property priced at RM500,000 or less pays no stamp duty on the transfer or on the loan agreement, for a sale and purchase agreement executed on or before 31 December 2027 (P.U.(A) 448/2025 and 449/2025). The exemption is claimed at stamping, so tell your solicitor before the agreement is signed.
What commonly goes wrong
An agreement that was never stamped
An unstamped agreement is not void, but it cannot be used in evidence until it is stamped and the late penalty paid. Tenancy agreements are the usual casualty. LHDN is running a penalty amnesty for documents signed between 2023 and 2025.
Check the stamping amnesty
A restriction in interest on the title
Many titles carry a restriction that the land may not be transferred or charged without State Authority consent. The sale cannot complete until the consent is issued, and the completion period must allow for it.
A caveat, a charge, or arrears on the title
A private caveat blocks registration until it is withdrawn or removed. An existing charge must be discharged. Unpaid quit rent or assessment is settled from the seller’s proceeds before completion. All three are found by the title search, which is why it comes before the agreement.
A loan refused after the deposit was paid
Whether the deposit comes back depends on what the offer letter and the agreement say. Ask for a loan condition before you sign anything, and read what happens to the earnest deposit if the loan is not approved.
Buying from a developer
A new launch is sold under the Housing Development (Control and Licensing) Act 1966 on a prescribed agreement: Schedule G for landed property, Schedule H for a parcel in a building. The agreement is standard and cannot be rewritten by the developer, which is the protection the Act gives you.
The developer’s panel solicitor prepares the agreement and processes the transaction. That solicitor does not advise you. If the developer bears the legal fee for the agreement, it is still the developer’s solicitor. You may appoint your own solicitor to read the agreement and the loan documents with you.
The title usually comes later. Until the strata or individual title is issued, the property is held under the master title, and you buy by a deed of assignment. When the title is issued, the transfer is perfected in your name, and the charge in favour of your bank is perfected too. That is why a second bill for perfection of transfer arrives years after you move in.
If the developer delivers late, the agreement sets liquidated damages. Keep the booking receipt: the date you paid the booking fee is the date from which delay is measured.
Buying or selling as a foreign purchaser
A non-citizen, and a foreign company, needs the consent of the State Authority to acquire land under section 433B of the National Land Code. Each state sets its own minimum purchase price and its own list of property types a foreigner may buy. The application is made after the agreement is signed, and the agreement is conditional on it.
From 1 January 2026, stamp duty on a transfer of residential property to a non-citizen who is not a permanent resident is charged at a flat 8% under Item 32(ab) of the First Schedule to the Stamp Act 1949. Non-residential property stays on the earlier flat rate.
On a sale by a non-citizen, the buyer’s solicitor retains a larger part of the price for real property gains tax than on a sale by a citizen.
Corporate and project conveyancing
Developers and corporate purchasers bring us matters that run for years, not weeks. A land deal passes through acquisition, approvals, sales, titles and financing, and each stage sets up the next. Queennie Tai leads this work, from the first option agreement through to the final redemption, so one lawyer holds the whole picture.
What the firm acts on
Land acquisition
Option agreements, due diligence on the title and its encumbrances, sale and purchase agreements, joint-venture terms with landowners, and completion.
The approvals that follow
Conversion, subdivision and amalgamation, State Authority consent, and the developer licence and advertising permit applications under the Housing Development Act.
Sales documentation under the Housing Development Act
Schedule G, H, I and J sale and purchase agreements, deeds of assignment where the title has not yet issued, and the purchaser documentation a launch needs.
Master title and strata title
Master title charges and their partial discharges, strata applications, the issue of individual and strata titles, and the transfer to purchasers when the titles arrive.
Project financing
Bridging and end-financing security documents, partial discharges as units are sold, and the redemption of the project financing at the end.
Talk to Queennie
This work is usually arranged by introduction rather than found by search. If you are a developer, a landowner or a company with a land matter, the quickest route is a direct call.
Queennie Tai Zee Queen
Managing Partner, Conveyancing & Corporate
- Phone
- +6011-1533 4163
- queennie@tkp.com.my
Transferring property within the family
A transfer from a parent to a child, or between spouses, follows the same registration steps as a sale, but the stamp duty rules are different: a family gift may qualify for full or partial exemption, and the conditions on the relationship, the recipient’s citizenship and the title are strict. There is also a separate real property gains tax declaration that a gift does not remove.
Free tools, no sign-up
Each tool answers one question and shows the rule it relies on. None of them needs your name.
- Free
Legal Fees & Stamp Duty Calculator
The professional fee on the published scale and the stamp duty on the transfer and the loan, for a given price.
Open the calculator - Free
Love and affection transfer check
Six questions on the relationship, the title, the loan and citizenship. See whether a family transfer qualifies for stamp duty relief, and what comes next.
Check eligibility - Free
Stamp duty amnesty check
An unstamped tenancy, sale or loan agreement? See whether LHDN’s penalty amnesty covers it, and the deadline.
Check your document
Send us the offer letter before you sign it.
Problems with a property are easiest to fix before the agreement is signed. Send the offer letter or the title by WhatsApp, or call. Tai & Khan Partnership is a firm of advocates and solicitors in Petaling Jaya, and the conveyancing practice is led by Queennie Tai.
Common questions
How long does a sub-sale purchase take from the agreement to the keys?
The agreement usually gives three months to complete, with an extension of one month on payment of late interest. Add the time for State Authority consent if the title is restricted, and for the bank to release the loan. Four to five months is common.
How many separate times will I be billed during a purchase?
Usually three or four: for the sale and purchase agreement, for the loan documents, for the transfer and stamping, and for completion. A purchase from a developer adds a bill for perfection of transfer when the title is issued, often years later. The timeline above lists what falls due at each stage.
What is the difference between the legal fee, disbursements and stamp duty?
The professional fee is the solicitor’s charge, on a scale set by law. Disbursements are payments the solicitor makes for you, such as searches and registration fees. Stamp duty is a tax paid to LHDN. Only the first of the three is the firm’s.
Can I use my own solicitor if I am buying from a developer?
Yes. The developer’s panel solicitor processes the transaction for the developer and does not advise you. You may appoint your own solicitor to read the agreement and the loan documents with you.
Who pays the stamp duty on the transfer, the buyer or the seller?
The buyer, by convention and by the usual terms of the agreement. The seller pays real property gains tax on any gain, and part of the price is retained at completion on account of it.
What is perfection of transfer, and why does it happen years after I moved in?
When you buy from a developer before the title is issued, you buy by a deed of assignment. When the strata or individual title is finally issued, the transfer into your name is registered, and the charge to your bank with it. That registration is the perfection, and it is billed when it happens.
Do I need State Authority consent, and how do I know?
Consent is needed if the title carries a restriction in interest, if the buyer is a non-citizen or a foreign company, and for certain categories of land. The title search shows the restriction. Your solicitor makes the application, and the agreement is conditional on it.
Related pages
Who we are
Tai & Khan PartnershipAdvocates & Solicitors
Queennie Tai, Managing Partner · Harith Khan, Partner
No. 36A, Jalan SS 21/58, Damansara Utama, 47400 Petaling Jaya, SelangorRules checked on 5 September 2026.
This page explains the law in general terms. It is not legal advice on your transaction, and using it does not make you a client of the firm.