Your passport does not decide your Malaysian tax status. Neither does the 182-day rule, not on its own.
There are four ways to end up a Malaysian tax resident, and three of them catch people who were barely here.
Miss all four and you are a non-resident. Your rent is then taxed at a flat 30% of taxable income, with none of the breaks a resident gets.
That 30% does not land on the rent you collect. Costs come off it first, and the tax office names six of them.
The cost of finding your very first tenant is not one.
Malaysia counts your days, not your passport
Here is how the tax office puts it:
The residence status of an individual for a basis year for a year of assessment is determined by reference to his physical presence in Malaysia and not by his nationality or citizenship.
That rule is section 7 of the Income Tax Act 1967 (PDF). It gives four ways to be a resident. You only need to meet one of them.
| Test | You are a resident if |
|---|---|
| (a) | You are in Malaysia 182 days or more in the tax year |
| (b) | You are here fewer than 182 days, but those days join a run of 182 days or more that carries in from the year before or on into the year after |
| (c) | You are here at least 90 days this year, and in at least three of the last four years you were either a Malaysian tax resident or here at least 90 days |
| (d) | You are a resident in the year after, and were a resident in all three years before |
The days do not have to run back to back. The tax office counts the total.
Look at test (b). The tax office’s own worked example (PDF) has a man in Malaysia for only 88 days in one year. He was still a resident, because those days joined a long stay carried over from the year before.
And test (d) does not count this year’s days at all. It looks at the years on either side.
So “I was here less than 182 days” does not settle it. Count your own days across several years, or ask a tax agent to.
If none of the four tests catch you, you are a non-resident.
What a non-resident pays
The tax office sets the non-resident rate (PDF, 5.7 MB) at a fixed 30% of taxable income. That has been the rate since the 2020 tax year.
A non-resident cannot claim personal tax breaks. They cannot claim the rebate that residents get either.
The phrase that matters is taxable income.
Your rent is not taxed where it lands. Allowed costs come off it first, what is left joins the rest of your income, and the 30% applies to the figure at the end of that sum. So it never touches your gross rent. It does not touch rent minus every bill you happened to pay that year either, which is the assumption most owners walk in with.
Some websites say non-residents pay 25%, taken from the full rent. That is not what the tax office publishes. Do not plan around it.
Six costs the tax office names
Public Ruling 12/2018 (PDF), issued on 19 December 2018, gives six examples of direct cost you can take off ordinary rental income.
That word is doing real work. The rule behind the list is wider than the list: a cost comes off if you spent it wholly and exclusively to earn that rent. These six are simply the ones the ruling chose to spell out. They are not a fence.
| The ruling names | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Assessment and quit rent | The yearly tax paid to the council, and quit rent paid to the land office |
| Loan interest | The interest, not the principal, on the loan used to buy the place you rent out. Timing and allocation rules apply |
| Fire insurance | The fire policy on the place you rent out |
| Cost of collecting rent | Collection fees, and legal costs to chase unpaid rent |
| Cost of renewing rent | Money spent to renew a tenancy, or to change tenant |
| Repairs | Normal repairs that keep the place in the state it is in |
Two of those will turn up in your letterbox in Medini, so here they are in full.
Assessment. This is the yearly tax the city council charges. In Medini the council is Majlis Bandaraya Iskandar Puteri, or MBIP. Its rates have been in place since 1 January 2024. MBIP’s own table lists Servis Apartment under Perdagangan, which means commercial, at 0.18%. Ordinary housing, Kediaman, sits at 0.11%. That grouping is MBIP’s, not our reading of it. The bill comes twice a year.
Quit rent. Johor now charges this on each apartment, not just on the land under the whole block. The law behind it is section 23C(8) of the Strata Titles Act 1985 (PDF), which says the tax is worked out from a rate for each square metre of your parcel, plus any accessory parcel such as a car park. Johor started charging it in 2025. You pay it straight to the land office, from 1 January each year and before 31 May, or a penalty is added.
Both come off your rent before tax. Neither can be turned into a ringgit figure today, and the last section of this article explains why not.
The trap in your first year
The same 2018 ruling draws a hard line.
You cannot take off what you spend to set the rental up in the first place. The law treats that as building the source of income, not as earning it.
The ruling names the costs it means:
cost to obtain the first tenant such as advertising cost, legal cost to prepare rental agreement, stamp duty and commission for real property agent
So the agent’s fee for your first tenant does not come off.
The agent’s fee when you later change tenant does come off. The list above allows money spent to renew a tenancy or to change tenant.
Same job, same bill, different answer. The only difference is that one of them is the first.
Does the pool make you a business?
Most owners get this one backwards.
Rent is normally taxed as rent. But if letting the place out counts as running a business, the whole calculation changes shape.
The test is whether building services are provided fully and actively. Fully means things like cleaning and repairs for the whole block: the structure, the stairs, fire escapes, lobbies, corridors and lifts. Actively means you provide them yourself, or you hire another person or firm to provide them for you. Paying someone else to do the work still counts as you doing it.
A Bodaiju tenant will use the pool, the gym and the garden deck. You do not run any of that, and you have not hired anyone to run it. The management body runs it, and you just pay a fee.
Example 7 of the 2018 ruling covers this exact case, and it uses apartments:
Services enjoyed by the tenants are merely an extension of Azrie’s right as proprietor of the apartment units and are not actively provided by Azrie.
Put simply: your tenant swims because you own a unit in the building, not because you built the pool or keep it clean. So it stays ordinary rent.
This next part is our reading, not the ruling’s. Short-stay letting is a different set of facts. The ruling does not say whether things like guest check-in, fresh linen and cleaning between guests are enough to change the answer. We are not going to stretch Example 7 past what it says. If you plan to rent by the night, show your real setup to a licensed tax agent and ask.
What we could not verify
What is the quit rent rate for a serviced apartment in Johor? What we checked: PTG Johor’s strata explanation pack of December 2024, and section 23C(8) of the Strata Titles Act 1985. Why it is unresolved: those set out the method, that the rate is per square metre and follows the express condition written on your title, but we could not find the ringgit rate for a Pangsapuri Perkhidmatan in a gazetted schedule. What we can say: the method, who bills it, and when it is due. What we will not infer: the rate. Figures circulate online, and we could not trace one to a primary document. How to settle it: ask the PTG Johor counter for the gazetted rate for your title’s express condition.
What will the assessment bill be? What we checked: MBIP’s published rate table. Why it is unresolved: MBIP charges 0.18% of a value it works out itself, and it cannot value a building that is not built yet. What we can say: the rate is known today. What we will not infer: the amount. You cannot work it out from the price you paid. How to settle it: wait for MBIP’s bill after the building is finished.
Can you take off the maintenance fee and the sinking fund? What we checked: the six examples given in the 2018 ruling, and the rule they sit under. Why it is unresolved: the ruling does not name them, either way. What we can say: they are not among the six examples, and the six are examples rather than a closed list. What we will not infer: that being left off the list settles it. Not naming something is not the same as ruling it out, and it is not the same as allowing it. How to settle it: ask a licensed tax agent.
Who gets the quit rent bill in Medini? What we checked: the same PTG pack. Why it is unresolved: Medini land is held in an unusual way, on a long lease rather than owned outright, and the pack does not cover that case. What we can say: the parcel owner is the one billed in the ordinary case. What we will not infer: whether that is you or the head landlord under a long lease. How to settle it: ask the land office, or your own lawyer, before you sign.
Where this comes from
- Public Ruling No. 12/2018, Income From Letting Of Real Property (PDF). Inland Revenue Board of Malaysia, 19 December 2018. Paragraphs 4.2.1 and 4.2.2 for the fully-and-actively test, 8.2 for the six examples, 8.3 for initial expense, and Example 7. Still listed as Asal on LHDN’s public rulings index and not marked as replaced, checked 9 August 2026. That index does mark other rulings as replaced, so the absence of a mark carries weight.
- Public Ruling No. 11/2017, Residence Status Of Individuals (PDF). Inland Revenue Board of Malaysia, 22 December 2017. Paragraph 6.3.1 for the section 7(1)(c) test.
- Tax Treatment Residents & Non-Residents (T2025) (PDF, 5.7 MB). Inland Revenue Board of Malaysia. Residence by physical presence, the four section 7 tests, and the 30% non-resident rate with no relief or rebate.
- Income Tax Act 1967, section 7, section 33(1), and paragraphs 4(a) and 4(d).
- Penilaian & Cukai Taksiran. Majlis Bandaraya Iskandar Puteri. Rates effective 1 January 2024, made under sections 127, 129, 137 and 163 of the Local Government Act 1976.
- Penerangan Hakmilik Strata (PDF). Pejabat Tanah dan Galian Johor, December 2024. Section 23C(8) of the Strata Titles Act 1985 [Act 318], the per square metre method, the 2025 start, and the 1 January to 31 May payment window.
Both public rulings carry the line Translation from the original Bahasa Malaysia text. Where the two versions differ, the Malay is the one that counts.
Sources checked 9 August 2026.
This is not tax advice. It is what the published rules say, with the gaps marked.