Short answer: furnishing a bare Johor Bahru condo to the point where it can be listed as a homestay costs RM14,288 for a 2-bedroom on Magic Touch's hotel-style package, and up to RM72,888 for a 3-bedroom at own-stay grade. Prices include the design fee and exclude SST. Most owners land between RM14,288 and RM35,288, and on our owners' real monthly statements that pays back in roughly three to seven peak-season months. Below is the full price table, the item-by-item rates behind it, and the payback maths.
How much does it cost to turn a JB condo into a homestay?
Search "renovation cost Malaysia" and the first page is Qanvast, Houz and the renovation-cost guides: RM25,000 to 45,000 for a standard condo renovation, plus RM8,000 to 15,000 for basic furniture if it is an investment unit. Those figures are written for people who will live in the unit, and that creates two problems for a homestay owner.
First, a homestay does not need an own-stay kitchen or a full wall of wardrobes, but it needs things an owner-occupier never buys: a smart lock, a headboard that photographs well, and kitchenware you will not mourn when a guest breaks it. Second, a home renovation has no payback period. A homestay does. Every extra thousand ringgit has to come back out of guest bookings.
So we split the price list by purpose, not by style. The table below is what Magic Touch (the renovation company inside the Antlerzone group, which set up the 100-plus units the group manages) currently lists in its shop. Design fee included, SST excluded:
| Series | Studio | 2-bedroom | 3-bedroom | Who it suits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hotel Style | RM14,288 | RM14,288 | RM18,888 | Tight budget, unit already in good shape, needs to be "clean, liveable, photogenic" |
| Budget Homestay | RM29,288 | RM29,288 | RM45,288 | Wants to look better than the unit next door without a big soft-furnishing bet |
| Standard Homestay | RM37,288 | RM35,288 | RM52,288 | Mid-to-upper price band, has to win on photos |
| Own Stay | RM36,288 | RM46,288 | RM72,888 | Owner will also live in it, or plans to sell |
The four series differ in material grade and how much soft furnishing goes in, not in whether something exists. Hotel Style puts the money into the bed, lighting, curtains and the lock: the things a guest actually touches. Own Stay does the kitchen cabinets, wardrobes and flooring in full. The exact inclusion list is on each shop page and on the itemised quotation after a site visit; this article is about the logic of the prices.
Why should a homestay not be renovated to own-stay standard?
One thing we are sure of after managing 100-plus units: what a guest pays per night has far less to do with your renovation budget than owners think.
The city-wide average short-stay rate in Johor Bahru is about RM266 a night (third-party market data). In the same building, a 2-bedroom furnished for RM14,000 and one furnished for RM45,000 usually differ by tens of ringgit a night, not hundreds. What separates incomes is occupancy: photo clarity, response speed, and whether the lock ever jams on a guest. None of that is a renovation line item.
On the other hand, a homestay has a few costs that owner-occupiers deprioritise and that hit bookings directly when skipped:
| Item | Shop rate | Why a homestay cannot skip it |
|---|---|---|
| Smart door lock | RM1,200 (one included free with every homestay package) | Self check-in, no key handover, code rotates at checkout |
| Whole-unit painting | Studio RM1,800 / 1-bed RM2,200 / 2-bed RM2,600 / 3-bed RM3,500 | Walls are the first thing in every photo; yellowed walls do not photograph |
| SPC flooring | RM7 per sqft (herringbone RM9) | Scratch and water resistant; survives dragged luggage |
| 18W downlight | RM80 each | Bright rooms look better in photos and in person |
| Shower screen | RM900 | Bathrooms without one are where bad reviews come from |
These five items alone come to roughly RM8,000 to 10,000 for a 2-bedroom, which is most of the hotel-style package. The RM14,288 is not "saving" anywhere in particular; it is simply all spent where guests will notice.
Is RM14,288 enough for a 2-bedroom, line by line?
Take an 800 sqft bare 2-bedroom and use the shop's current unit rates:
| Item | Working | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Whole-unit painting (2-bed) | fixed | RM2,600 |
| SPC 4mm flooring | 800 sqft × RM7 | RM5,600 |
| Skirting | about 150 ft × RM4 | RM600 |
| Downlights | 12 × RM80 | RM960 |
| Shower screen | 1 bathroom | RM900 |
| Smart lock | included in package | RM0 |
| Hard-works subtotal | RM10,660 |
After the hard works there is about RM3,600 left for bed frames, mattresses, curtains and basic appliances. That is why the hotel-style package assumes the unit is already in decent shape. If the ceiling needs redoing (plaster ceiling RM5 per sqft, so RM4,000 for 800 sqft) or the kitchen needs cabinets (top-and-bottom cabinets at RM620 to 700 per foot of width, so an 8-foot kitchen is RM5,000 and up), move straight up to Budget Homestay instead of squeezing it in.
Custom carpentry is where budgets blow up: wardrobes run RM650 to 750 per foot of width and a TV console RM350 per foot. Two 6-foot wardrobes and an 8-foot TV console in a 2-bedroom is RM10,000 to 11,000 on their own. Most of the forty-thousand-ringgit gap between Hotel Style and Own Stay is sitting there.
How many months to pay back the renovation?
This is the question that actually matters to an owner. We use one of our owners' real monthly statements for 10 Johor Bahru units (full breakdown in this article): in December 2025, peak season, the 10 units grossed RM67,081 and the owner received RM50,311, an average of RM5,031 per unit. In the low months (November 2025, February and May 2026) gross per unit dropped to RM2,388 to 3,182, roughly 40 to 50 percent of peak.
Averaging peak and low months, a conservative year-round figure for a 2-bedroom is about RM3,500 a month in the owner's hands. Payback:
| Package | 2-bedroom price | Peak month (RM5,031) | Year-round average (RM3,500) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hotel Style | RM14,288 | about 3 months | about 4 months |
| Budget Homestay | RM29,288 | about 6 months | about 8.5 months |
| Standard Homestay | RM35,288 | about 7 months | about 10 months |
| Own Stay | RM46,288 | about 9 months | about 13 months |
Two things to be clear about. First, this is a worked example using one owner's numbers, not a guarantee for your unit: building, layout and floor will all move it. Second, this is money in the owner's hands before the mortgage and maintenance fee. If the unit would otherwise sit empty, the comparison is against zero; if a long-term tenant was paying RM1,800, the comparison is against that RM1,800.
The payback table also shows something that is not necessarily good for our business, but needs saying: an extra thirty thousand ringgit does not earn an extra thirty thousand back. Going from Hotel Style to Own Stay might lift the nightly rate by RM30 to 50, which is RM600 to 900 a month, so the price difference takes over three years to recover from rate alone. The reason to go up a tier should be "guests in this building expect it" or "I will live here one day", never "a pricier fit-out gets more bookings".
When does the own-stay tier make sense?
There are three situations where we tell owners to go up a tier:
One, the building itself is upper-mid. A guest arriving with a RM400-a-night budget will swipe past a RM14,000 fit-out. In that building, Standard Homestay is the ticket in, not a bonus.
Two, the unit will be lived in or sold later. Own-stay kitchen cabinets, wardrobes and flooring are still there in three years; hotel-style furniture will probably need a refresh by then.
Three, several units in one building. One design, one procurement run, one price per unit: material costs fall with volume and the gap between Standard and Own Stay narrows.
The reverse also holds. If this is your first unit, the money is borrowed and the building is mid-priced, do Hotel Style, recover it in three or four months, and decide on upgrades with money the unit has already earned. That is far safer than putting RM40,000 in on day one.
How are payment and timing arranged?
Magic Touch works on a 30 percent deposit to start, with the balance on milestones. A furnishing package runs two to three weeks from deposit to handover according to the website; a full renovation that touches wet areas, wiring and carpentry runs six to ten weeks, depending on building approvals. Many management offices must approve a renovation application before materials go up in the lift, and that waiting time is not in the contractor's hands.
The unit is handed over already photographed. That matters more for a homestay than for a home: the day you get the keys back, the photos can go on the listing, instead of waiting another month for a photographer. If you want AntlerHub for self check-in, the lock is connected on handover day.
Is it cheaper to buy the furniture yourself?
Yes, and we do not argue against it. The shop's size-based calculator and the Taobao sourcing extension let you build a budget yourself and then decide whether to hand it to us or order it on your own. Doing it yourself saves the margin; it costs time. Ordering a 2-bedroom's furniture from Taobao, waiting for everything to arrive, assembling and placing it usually takes four to six weeks, and someone has to be in Johor Bahru to receive deliveries.
An empty unit in peak season is about RM5,000 of opportunity cost per month. Run that number yourself: if you have the time, buying your own is the better deal; if you do not, outsourcing is.
Check the law and the building rules first
Any work that touches walls, wet areas or wiring needs a renovation application to the management office first; most strata buildings charge a renovation deposit and restrict working hours. Separately, condo short stays in Johor Bahru have no single licence yet, but a building can restrict short-term rental through its house rules, so confirm the management's position before renovating. We covered that in what you actually need for a homestay licence in Johor Bahru. This article is a price reference only, not legal or tax advice; whether renovation costs can be set against rental income is a question for a licensed tax agent.
Next step
All four series and three unit types are on the Magic Touch pricing page with current prices, and a numbered quotation can be generated online. If you would rather know first what your building can earn per month as a homestay, and size the renovation budget from there, run the numbers at /ownerenquiry.