It was an audacious real estate project undertaken a decade ago by a Chinese developer: a $100 billion city in Malaysia built on sand and shrubby mangroves and sold as a luxury “dream paradise” for China’s middle class.

Many of Forest City’s residents today are transient — the caretakers of the grounds who sweep the empty roads and pick up the garbage, trim the hedges and water the plants.

“I see so many new faces,” said Thana Selvi, who works at KK Supermart, a brightly lit convenience store that stands out among the mostly boarded-up, empty spaces on the street level. She rents a room in an apartment above the shop, month to month, for $118.

At a distance, Forest City’s rows of high-rises tower over the Johor Strait between Singapore and Malaysia like a monument to China’s economic triumphs. Up close, the streets are quiet, most apartments are dark and large stone slabs demarcate the lush forest from the “land to be developed.”