I spent a night in one of the empty apartments in Malaysia's $100 billion ghost town, and I can see why very few people want to live there

I arrived in Forest City on a Friday afternoon. A row of businesses — from a furniture store to a hotpot restaurant — lined the road to the condominium where I stayed the night. One business owner, who declined to be named, said they opened their shop in October.

It was significantly busier than when I had first visited two years earlier. There was barely anyone around then, but now, a few dozen people were walking the streets and patronizing the shops.

I had high expectations for the condo, as Forest City had long branded its properties as upscale. In a July press release, Forest City said it offers "luxury high-rise waterfront apartments."

According to the press release, unit prices in Forest City start at 510,000 Malaysian ringgit, or $108,000. It's expensive for Johor, the Malaysian state where Forest City is located.

Muhammad Najib Razali, a professor of real estate at Malaysia Technology University, told me properties in Johor usually sell below 300,000 ringgit — the price considered affordable among the state's middle-income households.

Locals are not the target market for these upscale condos. Some 98% of units sold in Forest City were purchased by foreign buyers, according to data cited in a 2017 paper by Ong Kian Ming, a Fullbright scholar and Malaysia's Deputy Minister of International Trade and Industry. In June 2017, Country Garden told Bloomberg it had sold 16,000 units.

The complex looked pristine from the outside, with each 39-story building covered in greenery. But when I entered the lobby, it was far less manicured.

The elevators were plastered with peeling wallpaper with Forest City's logo and a phrase in Chinese and English that read: "Going home is the beginning of a new life."

My unit for the night was on the seventh floor. There were around 20 units on the floor. Each of the units had a window that faced the hallway. I peered into them and could see that most of the units were either sparsely furnished or outright unfurnished.

Two of the units were used by the condo's staff — I spotted several men in uniforms leaving and entering the room — with a few pairs of shoes left outside the door.

In 2022, a Forest City representative told me more than 20,000 residential units had been sold. Now, it appeared that many of these units were vacant.

A resident at another apartment complex in Forest City told me they were the only people living on their floor. They added that most other floors in the building also only had one resident.

One reason so many units are empty is because many people bought them as investment properties, Najib said.

"Some buyers thought that Forest City, in terms of the rental market, would be much easier to see return," he said.

One local business owner, who declined to be named, told me she also worked as a property agent in Forest City and currently had 50 units available for rent.

According to units listed on the property site iProperty, a three-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment at the condo costs as little as 1,100 ringgit, or $235, to rent per month. In comparison, renting a similar unit at Danga Bay — Country Garden's first venture in Malaysia just 20 miles from Forest City — costs over 2,300 ringgit a month.

The unit wasn't anything special. It had a simple, three-person couch, a small wooden coffee table, and no TV.

The apartment measured 635 square feet and had a master bedroom, two smaller rooms, and one common bathroom. There was also a compact kitchen with two stoves near the entrance.

According to the property website EdgeProp, the average house in Johor is nearly double the size of this unit, at around 1,264 square feet.

Koh Sin Yee, an adjunct senior research fellow with Monash University Malaysia, told me locals in Johor often prefer to purchase landed properties rather than high-rise apartments. She said this deters many locals — even those who can afford it — from buying a house and living in Forest City.

According to data referenced in Ong's 2017 paper, at the time, only 78 out of the 5,344 units sold in Forest City were sold to Malaysians.

Unlike the other two bedrooms, the master bedroom had natural light streaming in from a large window. One of the common rooms faced the hallway, and when the blinds were opened, I could see straight into the hallway. At night, it felt eerie, as I could hear every little noise from the outside, from the rustling of leaves to insects chirping.

The common rooms were furnished with nothing but a single bed. I could feel the plastic still wrapped around the mattresses when I lay down.

Dirt and dead moths had piled up in the shower.

Showering was uncomfortable. The drain was clogged up, so I ended up ankle-deep in water.

On its website, Forest City marketed these villas as a "peaceful retreat or a luxurious vacation home." These villas are larger than the apartments, with a living area between 753 square feet and 1,862 square feet. A total of 482 villas are set to be completed by 2026.

The villas looked like modern townhouses. Each villa had a rooftop and garage. Forest City hasn't announced how much these villas will cost.

Outside, there was a swimming pool, several outdoor gyms, and a playground.

There was no one at the pool in the morning. The Jacuzzi was full of cloudy-looking water.

I spotted a total of three residents, one of whom was blasting a song in Chinese from her phone and exercising on one of the tai chi spinners at the outdoor gym.

It looked like an average residential neighborhood in Singapore — with its endless blocks of public housing and the ubiquitous sight of plants and trees — but without the people.

I headed for a meal at one of several Chinese restaurants just outside the condo. During my first visit, most of these stores were vacant. But now, it was where I found the most signs of life.

The moment I stepped into the restaurant, I was transported to China. Chinese pop music blared from the speakers as cigarette smoke wafted into the air.

Nearly everyone inside only spoke Chinese. Despite speaking Malay, the national language, I had to resort to pointing at items on the menu to order.

The area had become an enclave of sorts: The other stores nearby were also Chinese restaurants or convenience stores that sold household goods from China. There, people told me they were from the mainland, too, and only spoke Chinese.

"A certain demographic of Chinese people may prefer this kind of lifestyle in Malaysia," Koh said, adding that Forest City offers a lower cost of living than major cities in China and is designed in a way that's familiar to where Chinese residents may have lived back home.