The government is looking into measures to allow more first-time house buyers to secure a bank loan to purchase affordable houses priced at RM300,000 and below, Finance Minister II Johari Abdul Ghani said today.

"We want to discuss how to help genuine buyers who want to buy houses priced at RM300,000 and below," he said at a property forum organised by Rehda Institute today.

People in this group are not able to secure a loan because of their salary threshold, Johari said.

A survey by Bank Negara Malaysia indicated that the affordability of a secured loan is between RM200,000 and RM250,000, according to him.

"You cannot be too strict with first-time house buyers because, sometimes, they are good borrowers," Johari told reporters after the forum.

"We need to be flexible. I think we need to engage with the banks and see how we can help," he said.

"The government must facilitate this; if not the banks will be very protective of their capital," he said, adding that the government wanted to bridge the gap between banks and these house-buyers.

The risks of house buyers being unable to repay their loans would be very minimum because the banks would be able to collect higher prices when they auction the houses, he said.

Pressed further on this, Johari said the government may announce the outcome of its finding in the 2017 Budget.

Besides more flexibility on housing loan for first-time buyers, he also said the government was studying whether policies on housing industry needed to be adjusted to ensure the industry continues to contribute to economic growth.

Johari also noted the unevenness in the sub-segments of the housing market, where demand for affordable housing priced below RM250,000 has outstripped supply, particularly in the urban area.

Twenty-one percent of houses completed in 2014 were priced below RM250,000, he said.

There was an oversupply in higher-end properties tagged above RM500,000, he said.

"This development has increasingly priced out more urban Malaysian households from the housing market," he added.

"Efforts to curb house price speculation also need to be intensified as part of the broader measures to tackle the issue of housing affordability," he said.

According to him, macro-prudential and fiscal measures that are in place - such as the loan-to-value measures, responsible lending guideline, higher real property gains tax (RPGT) and the prohibition of developer interest-bearing scheme (DIBS) - remained instrumental in maintaining the long-term sustainability of the property market and mitigating potential risks to financial stability.