Top Bali asking prices, Jakarta's priciest land, bamboo villas on leasehold and the private islands listed online that the state says cannot be sold to foreigners.
Bali is one of the few places where a buyer can find a cliff-edge trophy villa, a house made of bamboo and an offer to buy an island, all in the same week of searching. The headlines are spectacular. The legal reality is far stricter than the listings suggest, and that gap is the useful part of this story. Below is what was published, with the source and date; nothing here is offered through us, and prices change fast.
The top of the Bali market: asking prices, not records
We did not find a verified record sale for Bali, so we do not name one. What exists is agency price guides. A 2026 guide on villabalisale.com puts luxury villas at 1 million to more than 6 million US dollars, describing the top end as cliff-front Uluwatu or beachfront Seseh. Another 2026 guide on balivillarealty.com uses a six-bedroom off-plan villa at 6.5 million dollars as its example of the largest category. These are asking prices from agencies.
Even the data on the middle of the market disagree. Two 2026 guides give very different median villa prices for Petitenget, the area one of them calls the most expensive, so we quote neither as fact. A Bali seller's guide on baliexception.com says plainly that online listings do not reflect actual transaction prices and that reliable sales data is limited. A record in Bali is therefore a headline about a listing, not a benchmark.
For the areas themselves, see where to buy in Canggu, Uluwatu and Ubud and prices, yield and rules in Bali.
Jakarta: the record is the land
In the capital the extreme is not a house but the ground under it. Okezone reported on 10 July 2025 that land in the Menteng district can reach 100 to 250 million rupiah per square metre, with Jalan Tasikmalaya averaging about 125 million. DetikProperti has described house prices there as running into tens of billions of rupiah, and Bisnis.com reported in 2019 that some luxury Menteng homes were offered at 56 to 72 billion rupiah. We found no single record sale or current top listing, and these are press price levels, not registered transactions.
Bamboo houses: unusual, and usually leasehold
The most distinctive Bali property type is the bamboo house. Listings we saw in October 2026 on agency sites included The Bamboo Sanctuary in Tibubeneng, Canggu, a leasehold villa with a curved bamboo roof at 250,000 dollars (balivillarealty.com), and a bamboo villa in Buduk, Canggu, on 217 square metres of land at 259,000 dollars (prestigepropertybali.com). The listings carry no date, so read them as examples of the range, not offers.
Notice the word leasehold. The famous cliffside bamboo villas that appear in search results are mostly holiday rentals, not properties for sale. We found no cave or floating villas for sale in Bali.
Islands: listed online, not legally for sale to foreigners
This is the best story in Indonesia. On 18 June 2025, listings for several Indonesian islands appeared on Privateislandsonline.com, a Canada-based site. Four were in the Anambas archipelago in the Riau Islands, and others in other provinces (Mongabay, July 2025). The government blocked the site for users in Indonesia. On 23 June 2025 the fisheries ministry said, according to Antara, that foreign nationals cannot own islands in Indonesia and that the listings were more likely offers seeking foreign investment than real sales. Antara added that the islands lie in a conservation area, and that the smallest, Tokongsendok, covers 0.07 square kilometres.
The legal position, as reported:
- A legal scholar wrote in Hukumonline on 29 July 2025 that Indonesian law has no mechanism for anyone, Indonesian or foreign, to own a whole island. Only parcels of land on it can carry rights, such as a building right or a right of use.
- Small islands are governed by Law 1 of 2014. Antara reported that private control of land is capped and the state keeps at least 30 percent; Mongabay reads the cap differently, so ask a lawyer for the exact rule for the island in question.
- Commercial use is possible with permits. Mongabay reported that charges for foreign investors are set by a 2021 regulation and that the ministry opened an online portal for small-island investment permits in 2024.
- Enforcement is real. RRI reported on 16 April 2026 that a resort on Maratua island in East Kalimantan was sealed on 10 April, reportedly because foreigners ran it without proper permits, and that the island of Umang in Banten was sealed after a social-media advertisement offered it for 65 billion rupiah, nearly 4 million dollars. The ad was removed and officials said they were examining ownership.
A watchdog group counted 254 privatised small islands in Indonesia as of June 2025 (KIARA, via Mongabay). So privatisation exists, but it is not a route open to a foreign buyer. For the general picture, see islands and island homes and island real estate.
What foreigners can actually hold
A foreigner cannot own freehold land in Indonesia. The usual routes are a long leasehold, a right of use called Hak Pakai that needs a valid residence permit, or a company structure. Guides disagree on the total term of Hak Pakai, giving between 70 and 80 years with extensions, so check the current figure with a notary. One 2026 guide says the rules did not change this year but that enforcement on green-zone land and permits in Canggu has tightened. See leasehold, Hak Pakai and PT PMA explained.
What an ordinary buyer should take from it
- A headline price in Bali is an agency listing. Ask for comparable registered sales before you believe a number.
- Leasehold is the normal Bali structure. Price the remaining years, the extension terms and what happens at the end.
- If an agent offers you an island, the first question is what exactly you would hold. Under the reported rules, not the island.
- Check the land zoning. Green zones and permits are where problems appear in Canggu.
- Confirm the permit and the registered right with a notary you chose, before any deposit.
- Unusual properties such as bamboo houses are hard to insure, finance and resell. Plan the exit.
If you are weighing an unusual property in Indonesia, an independent buyer-side adviser such as D.H. Realting, based in Warsaw, can help line up local lawyers and notaries who have been checked first.