If you’ve been researching MM2H and assumed it’s one national programme with the same rules wherever in Malaysia you settle, that assumption is wrong, and it’s worth correcting before it costs you a wasted application. Malaysia actually runs three separate long-stay second-home programmes: federal MM2H, which covers Peninsular Malaysia (West Malaysia); Sabah-MM2H, run independently by the state of Sabah; and Sarawak’s S-MM2H, run independently by Sarawak’s own state ministry. Each has its own deposit structure, its own property rules, and — this is the part that trips people up — residency under one doesn’t automatically transfer to the others. If you’re set on Sabah or Sarawak specifically, you need to apply to that state’s programme, not the federal one.
Federal MM2H: Peninsular Malaysia, property compulsory
The federal programme, administered by the Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture (MOTAC), is the one most people mean when they say “MM2H” without qualification, and it covers property and residency in Peninsular Malaysia. As covered in our companion piece on Malaysia’s long-term visa options, it runs three main tiers — Silver, Gold, and Platinum — each pairing a fixed-deposit requirement with a compulsory property purchase in West Malaysia, at minimums of RM 600,000, RM 1,000,000, and RM 2,000,000 respectively. Minimum applicant age across the three main tiers is 25.
Sabah-MM2H: its own tiers, and a high-rise-specific property rule
Sabah runs a genuinely separate programme rather than a regional branch of the federal one. Sabah-MM2H’s deposit structure echoes the federal tier names — Silver at RM 500,000, Gold at USD 500,000, Platinum at USD 1,000,000 — but the property requirement carries a specific twist the federal programme doesn’t: purchases must be high-rise units, not landed property, at minimums scaling with tier (roughly RM 600,000 up to RM 2,000,000 depending on the tier), held for a minimum of 10 years, though the programme permits exchanging one qualifying property for another within that period. Sabah-MM2H also runs its own offshore income test — RM 10,000 a month for a single applicant, RM 15,000 for a couple or family, verified against the latest three months of bank statements — a requirement the federal programme’s current rules have reportedly moved away from. Visa duration tracks the deposit tier: 5 years for Silver, 10 for Gold, 20 for Platinum, all renewable, with a minimum stay requirement of just 30 days a year in Sabah — a third of the SEZ track’s 90-day requirement under the federal system, and dramatically more flexible than a full-time-residency expectation.
Sarawak S-MM2H: the outlier — property is genuinely optional
Sarawak’s programme, S-MM2H, is administered independently by the Sarawak Ministry of Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts, and it departs from both the federal and Sabah models in a way worth understanding clearly: property purchase is entirely optional, not a condition of the visa at all. Instead, S-MM2H is built around a single flat fixed deposit of RM 500,000 placed with a Sarawak-based bank — the same amount whether you’re applying alone or as a couple, with up to half withdrawable after the first year for approved purposes like property, a vehicle, medical costs, or education. Alongside the deposit, applicants must also clear an income-or-assets test: either RM 10,000 a month in offshore income (RM 15,000 with dependants), or RM 100,000 in liquid assets (RM 200,000 with dependants) — an either/or structure that gives applicants without steady monthly income a genuine alternative path, which neither the federal programme nor Sabah’s version offers in the same form. There’s also a processing fee of RM 5,000, introduced in January 2025.
If you do choose to buy property in Sarawak under S-MM2H, the foreign-ownership minimum is RM 500,000 in mixed-zone residential areas, with a comparatively short 5-year resale restriction — shorter than the holding expectations under the other two programmes. Visa validity is also shorter overall: 5 years, renewable once, for a 10-year maximum, compared with federal MM2H’s and Sabah-MM2H’s 20-year top tiers. Minimum stay is 30 days a year, same as Sabah, applying to the principal applicant. One more genuine outlier: the minimum age for S-MM2H is 30, five years higher than the 25-year floor under both federal MM2H and Sabah-MM2H.
The three programmes, side by side
| Federal MM2H (Peninsular) | Sabah-MM2H | Sarawak S-MM2H | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Administrator | MOTAC (federal) | Sabah state government | Sarawak MTCP |
| Property purchase | Compulsory, all tiers | Compulsory, high-rise only | Optional |
| Entry-tier deposit | USD 150,000 (Silver) | RM 500,000 (Silver) | RM 500,000 (flat) |
| Top-tier visa length | 20 years (Platinum) | 20 years (Platinum) | 10 years max |
| Minimum stay/year | Varies by tier (90 days on SEZ track) | 30 days | 30 days |
| Minimum age | 25 | 25 | 30 |
| Income test | Reportedly waived | Required (RM 10k–15k/month) | Income OR liquid assets |
Reading this table left to right makes the actual decision clearer than reading three separate programme descriptions in isolation: Sarawak is the lightest commitment if you’re not sure about property yet, Sabah suits someone who wants a specific high-rise property and can document steady offshore income, and federal MM2H suits someone set on Peninsular Malaysia specifically and comfortable with the largest property price tags of the three.
Why this actually matters for your decision, not just your paperwork
The property-optional structure in Sarawak is the single biggest practical difference for anyone who wants long-term Malaysian residency without committing to a specific real estate market. Under federal MM2H or Sabah-MM2H, your deposit and your property purchase are both locked in together — you’re making a real estate bet on that specific state’s market at the same time you’re securing residency. Under S-MM2H, you can secure residency on the deposit alone and decide separately, later, whether buying property in Sarawak actually makes sense for you, or simply rent instead. If you’re not yet certain Sarawak — or Malaysia generally — is where you want to put down long-term roots, that optionality is worth real money in flexibility, even before comparing headline deposit figures.
The income-or-assets alternative in Sarawak is the second meaningful difference. Federal MM2H’s current structure is reported to have moved toward a pure wealth test (deposit plus property, no ongoing income requirement), while Sabah-MM2H still requires ongoing offshore income verification. Sarawak sits in between, letting an applicant qualify on savings alone if they don’t have steady monthly income, which matters for someone retired and living off a lump sum rather than an active salary or business income.
The 30-day minimum stay under both Sabah-MM2H and Sarawak S-MM2H, versus a stricter requirement under parts of the federal system, also matters if your plan is to split time between Malaysia and elsewhere rather than live there full-time. Thirty cumulative days a year is a genuinely light residency requirement by regional standards — closer to a part-time-base arrangement than a full relocation — and it’s one of the more underappreciated advantages of the two East Malaysian programmes for someone who wants a Malaysian base without giving up a home base elsewhere.
What this means if you’re choosing a state for family reasons, not just cost
Most comparisons of these three programmes stop at deposit size and property rules, but if you’re relocating with a family, the state you choose determines a lot more than your visa cost. Sabah and Sarawak’s economies, expat communities, and international-schooling options are both smaller and more concentrated than what Peninsular Malaysia — particularly the Kuala Lumpur and Penang areas — offers. If international schooling, a large existing expat community, or proximity to a major international airport with frequent long-haul connections matters more to your family’s day-to-day life than the specific deposit or property numbers, that’s a real reason to weight federal MM2H’s Peninsular Malaysia location higher even if Sabah or Sarawak’s financial terms look more attractive on paper. Cost comparisons matter, but they’re only half the decision for a family relocating rather than an individual retiree.
Healthcare access follows a similar pattern. Peninsular Malaysia’s major private hospitals, concentrated around Kuala Lumpur and Penang, are generally better resourced for specialist and emergency care than facilities in Sabah or Sarawak’s smaller urban centres — worth weighing seriously if you or a family member has ongoing medical needs, regardless of which programme’s financial terms otherwise suit you best.
One structural point worth being clear-eyed about
None of these three programmes confer nationwide Malaysian rights identical to the others — a Sabah-MM2H or S-MM2H pass is tied to that specific state’s residency framework, and this piece could not independently verify, beyond what each state programme’s own materials state, exactly how residency and property rights interact if you later want to relocate from, say, Sarawak to Peninsular Malaysia under the same pass. If cross-state flexibility within Malaysia matters to your plans, that’s a specific question worth putting directly to an MM2H-authorised agent or the relevant state tourism ministry before choosing which of the three programmes to apply under — the answer isn’t something this research could pin down with confidence from public sources alone.
For the fuller breakdown of federal MM2H’s tier structure and how it stacks up against Malaysia’s other long-stay pathway, our guide to Malaysia’s long-term visa options in 2026 covers PVIP and the federal MM2H tiers in more depth than this piece does — worth reading together with this one if Peninsular Malaysia, rather than Sabah or Sarawak, ends up being your actual target. And if you’re weighing Malaysia against Thailand more broadly, our comparison of Thailand’s LTR and DTV visas runs the same kind of cost-and-commitment analysis for that market.
Sources
- MM2H.com — “Sabah MM2H”, accessed 20 Sep 2026
- Bratu Capital — “Sarawak S-MM2H Requirements 2026: The State Programme Explained”
- Hudson McKenzie — “MM2H Malaysia 2026: Requirements, Categories & How to Apply”
- The Malaysia Move — “MM2H 2026: The Complete Guide to Malaysia My Second Home”
Internal links (added before publish)
- Linked to the Malaysia long-term visa (MM2H vs PVIP) piece: https://livinglifeasia.com/malaysia-long-term-visa-2026/
- Linked to the Thailand LTR vs DTV comparison piece: https://livinglifeasia.com/thailand-ltr-vs-dtv-visa/
- (The RTS Johor-Singapore piece, a more natural companion, is later in this batch and doesn’t exist yet — recommend linking back to this piece from there once published.)
Editorial notes
- Sabah-MM2H’s exact dollar figures are single-sourced to an industry
consultancy site, not cross-confirmed against a second source or a
.gov.my/state-government page — disclosed in the source pack.
- Federal MM2H’s exact minimum-stay requirement for its three main tiers
was not confirmed with precision in this research pass — the draft
avoids stating an unverified day-count for those tiers specifically.
- The claim that federal MM2H has “moved away from” an income requirement
carries forward from the previously-published Malaysia visa piece’s
single-sourced finding on that point — flagged there and not
independently re-verified here.
- Word count verified via script.