Up or Down? (April 2019)
22/05/2019
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Image: BWPI

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In the past few months, China's property market has started to heat up gradually as more cities reported price gains. According to the data released by National Bureau of Statistics last week, 67 of 70 cities monitored by the government saw month on month growth in their new home prices, exceeding the numbers of 65 and 57 cities in March and February respectively.

​Price Trend

New Home Market

A weighted index calculated by Thomson Reuters shows the average new home prices of 70 Chinese cities were increased by 10.7 percent year on year in April, which is a 2 years high since April 2017.​
On a monthly basis, average new home prices rose 0.62 percent in April, up from 0.61 and 0.53 in March and February. Nevertheless, the figures in the three months are still relatively low in a one year comparison.
As for the four largest cities, the price in Guangzhou has been boosted most significantly by 1.1 percent, followed by Beijing, Shenzhen and Shanghai of 0.5, 0.4 and 0.3 percent respectively. The upward trend in the four cities results in a tier 1 average of 0.6 percent, compared with 0.8 and 0.5 percent in tier 2 and tier 3 cities.

Existing House Market & Sales Condition

For existing houses, 55 cities saw a monthly growth in April, down from 57 cities in March. Meanwhile, the average prices of second hand homes increased by 0.53 percent, higher than 0.46 percent in the March. 
The rebound is also observed in the property sales condition. According to the Bureau, the sales of property by floor area decreased only 0.3 percent year on year in January- April, after a deeper drop of 0.9 percent in the first quarter of this year. More specifically, the sales of residential buildings went up to 0.4 percent, compared with 12.4 percent and 8.8 percent decreases of office buildings and buildings for business use. 

Cities Warned Over Fast Price Growth

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Image: China.com
Analysts suggested that the rebound sales might be attributed to relaxed credit policy and the loosened control on Hukou in attracting talent in multiple cities. However, it's still difficult to say the market has entered a long term upward trajectory, since the recent upticks already raised government's attention for the potential curb measures.
For instance, four Chinese cities of Foshan, Suzhou, Dalian and Nanning have recently been alerted by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development after their home prices surged in the past three months. Similar warning was also issued last month, call for other six cities to "stabilise the market expectations and the prices of land and housing".

Year on Year Summary

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Image: BWPI
​I. Sales Prices of Newly Constructed Residential Buildings (excluding affordable housing).

Year-on-Year price changes:
  • Increased in all 70 cities (top 5 cities are Xi'an 23.8%, Hohhot 22.3%, Dali 21%, Qinhuangdao 20.1%, Guiyang 20.1%.)
  • No city remained at the same level.
  • No city reported price declines
    ​
​​II. Sales Prices of Second-Hand Residential Buildings.
​
​Year-on-Year price changes:
  • Increased in 68 cities (top 5 cities are Hohhot 22.1%, Dali 18.6%, Jining 16.7%, Kunming 15%, Sanya 14.1%.)
  • 1 city remained at the same level (Guangzhou)
  • Decreased in 1 city (Shanghai-1%)  

Other Housing News in Shenzhen

The government in Shenzhen has recently issued a series of policy documents for the property markets.​

​More Subsidised Home Provision

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Talents housing is a favorable policy initiated by the Shenzhen government. This policy allows to individuals who meet specified standards to live in the government funded houses at lower price than the market. Qualified talents include high-level scholars, professional experts and other nationally recognised talents (such as people Thousand Talents Program). Image: Shenzhen Talents Housing Group Co. Ltd
Last month, the Housing and Construction Bureau has issued three policy papers covering subsidy approaches on affordable housing, public rental housing and talents housing. The policy goal is to offer more subsidised homes for the middle-low income residents and the young talents. 
According to the documents, Shenzhen plans to newly build 1.7 million homes by 2035, and 60 percent of them will be provided at lower rates than the market. This new scheme intends to bring a similar model of Singapore to the city that more than 80 percent of homes in Singapore are government subsidised, according to Singapore's HDB Annual Report 2018
In details, the public rental houses will be offered at 30 percent of market rent for the middle and low income residents, affordable houses and talents houses will be sold or rented at 50 percent and 60 percent of the market rate respectively. 

Policy Guidelines

Similarly, Shenzhen Bureau of Planning and Natural Resources recently also issued policy to encourage more talents housing supplies through building talents houses on the land which has changed its land use to residential land.
According to the policy, if the commercial service land is changed to residential land, the part exceeding the original contracted construction area will be built as saleable talents houses, and the rest will be built for the residential houses on the market and related supporting facilities. If the industrial, logistics, storage and other land are changed to residential land, the residential part will be built as saleable talent houses, and the supporting commercial part will be constructed and sold in accordance with relevant regulations.  
This new policy will apply to the transferred unbuild land which has changed land use or adjusted plot ratio before October 9, 2015, and the term of validity is 5 years.

Stricter Measures on Redevelopment Projects
Developers who are holding large redevelopment projects may face more difficulties in Shenzhen. The government has decided to set a time limit for the city's redevelopment projects, and the relevant discussion draft was released by the Planning and Natural Resources Bureau this month.
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Urban Redevelopment Plan is set in the context of 13th Five-Year Plan of the Shenzhen. Image:Shenzhen Bureau of Planning and Natural Resources
The new measure aims to tackle the "zombie redevelopment projects" with slow project progress. Historically many redevelopment projects might be listed in the city's redevelopment plan, yet have not received a special approval. The time limit was set for one to three years in accordance with the announcement date of project. 
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Baishizhou is an urban village area where set to be redeveloped. Image: Theodore Kaye/ChinaFile
For those projects exceed the validity period, they will be removed from the city's redevelopment plan and will not be allowed to reapply the plan within 3 years. According to a preliminary estimation, about 300 of the 757 urban redevelopment units have been affected by this measure. Among them, urban village redevelopment projects account for one third and nearly 100 urban village redevelopment projects will be affected. 
Urban redevelopment in Shenzhen is considered as the major channel for developers to grab land resources in the future as the city is facing a shortage of land supply.   
 
​Read the original article at stats.gov
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