'Eerie' £80 billion ghost city is still perfectly maintained despite being almost empty
If you want to live in luxury and be bothered by no one, I think I have the place for you.
'Forest City' is Malaysia's $100 billion (£80 million) 'ghost town' that was built to house a population of around 700,000 people.
The intended eco-friendly city in Johor promised luxury living, modern infrastructure, and heavy investment from China.
But the project appeared to be doomed from the start in 2016 when developers faced a host of issues.
Advert
There ended up being a lack of investment from wealthy buyers, in part, due to changes in China’s capital controls in 2017.
YouTuber Ben Morris, who visited the city last year, explained: "It's speculated, the reasons behind this are down to a few different issues.
"First, a major property crisis in China occurred which not only affected developments in the country, but ones overseas as well.
"This had major repercussions for projects such as Forest City, where developers had run into major cash issues and couldn't finish what they had started.
"And lastly, this city was built to cater to a high ticket Chinese market, where the buyers would own a secondary property abroad."
Having run into a number of unexpected problems, most recent reports suggest that the city only has between 7,000 and 9,000 residents.
Even though there is a clear lack of life in the city, it still remains very much intact, according to people who have been there recently.
Content creator Thomas Brag, from the Yes Theory YouTube channel, explained: "It’s not like things are falling apart. Like it actually is well-maintained.
"It looks beautiful here. It’s fully built out. That’s the weird thing. It’s like it looks like it would be busy.
"It’s perfectly landscaped still. It’s like it’s maintained as if people do actually live here, but every single villa is just completely empty."
However, Nazmi Hanafiah, who moved to Forest City for just six months, said to the BBC: "I managed to escape this place."
The IT engineer, who rented out a one-bedroom flat, went on to explain: "I didn't care about my deposit, I didn't care about the money. I just had to get out.
"I'm getting goosebumps just being back. It's lonely around here - it's just you and your thoughts.
"To be honest, it's creepy. I had high expectations for this place, but it was such a bad experience. There is nothing to do here."
Topics: Travel, World News, Weird
Anish Vij