Oh dear. Was there ever a recent precedent where a country lost its visa free status? Or will Malaysia again make the news for being the first of an unwanted achievement?

No luck to hit the 25% chance and experience instant approval second time applying for 601 and both times also were also requested to submit documents. Maybe because I have an ongoing/pending subclass 190 hence cannot instant-approve 

The previous 601 expired dy after having fund times there so planning to do another trip end of the year

Hey… another one! Good luck with the application! May I know which part of Australia will you be? We should keep a little informal dossier of Malaysians retiring or moving to Australia and if we’re near enough, we can come out for meet ups and revive the original spirit of the kopitiam forum before the trolls and the cybertroopers took over….

will do!
Yeah I think the age group definitely didn't help, considering how many Malaysians of similar age group overstayed their tourist visa

And nice! Hope you'll be getting the 491 grant soon, the processing time have been going upwards like crazy the last year. 

It is very true indeed. It's pretty easy to cover the basic necessities here in Malaysia and once those are covered, everything else really is depending on how one would live their lifestyle. The only reason I'm actively pursuing is only not to leave regrets at the later stage in my life - regretting for not pursuing something I've been wanting to try, for better or worse

Not gonna lie, but the potential downstep from T20 to M40 is indeed a scary one, but still doing everything I can in my capacity and play my cards to hopefully land at least a lateral move. Fingers crossed.
Yeah those backlogs are huge indeed, last I checked (in FB groups with agents and all) that they're still processing April 2023 backlogs. Lodgement after May 2023 should stumble as you said, and hopefully it'll be done before a complete year.

I lodged mine Dec 2023, how about you?

Are you thinking of making the move straight away once your visa's approved, or will you adopt a "wait and see" approach? I'm just curious, because I took the latter road and I've been waiting and seeing for the past 15 years. This should be the last RRV I'm applying, I intend to finally pull the trigger and opt for early retirement in Sydney by next year...