Chinese housing market

A bus driver deliberately drove his vehicle off the road into a reservoir in southern China last week, killing 21 people on board in what police called an act of revenge against society over the government demolition of his former home. In Anshun, in the southern province of Guizhou, public security authorities said on Sunday that the 52-year-old driver, identified only by his surname Zhang, went to the residence on Tuesday morning. Zhang had permanent lease rights to the home, which was owned by a local authority, but the structure was earmarked for demolition as part of a “shantytown redevelopment plan.” He called a government hotline, complaining that his residence should not be destroye

Homebuyers promised “park views” in a new residential development were in for a shock on the weekend when they picked up the keys to their flats in the central Chinese city of Changsa. Imagine being pitched “high vegetation cover” and a “park lifestyle” only to discover a public area covered in a blue plastic material to look like a lake and a small timber bridge on pavement.  “So I’m supposed to be standing in the middle of blue water, which in fact doesn’t exist. There is no rock or plants,” one owner said, according to a report from Hunan Satellite TV’s City Channel from Sunday. Instead of grass, residents could “enjoy” a grass block paving, covered with yellow mud and dotted with wither

A collapsed building should be disastrous for home prices, right? Not if you're at the tech hub of Shenzhen. Homeowners at a residential estate in the Chinese megacity where a building collapsed this week raised their prices by nearly 20% within 24 hours of the incident. They bet buyers would be willing to pay a premium in the hope that the entire estate would be razed and redeveloped. A block of flats at the Heping Xinqu residential estate in the bustling Luohu district sank into the ground on August 28. No casualties were reported. The 29-year-old residential area has more than 100 homes. A broker said that a homeowner, who had put his apartment on the market for 3.1 million yuan ($433,300

Construction is nearly complete on a “horizontal skyscraper” in Chongqing, in China’s southwest. The Raffles City Chongqing complex has a futuristic design, including a bridge which spans across four of the eight buildings. Developers say the sky bridge, named “Crystal,” is one of the world’s highest, and will be a key feature of the $4.8 billion complex.  There are also apartments, a shopping center, offices and leisure facilities. Raffles City Chongqing is expected to open in late 2019. Watch the video above to find out more.

These days, many city dwellers across China live in the Champs-Elysees, shop in California Plaza and dine on Capitol Hill. These have been some of the most popular names for Chinese residential and commercial buildings. But maybe not for much longer. Cities across China are starting to get rid of foreign-sounding names on buildings, roads, shopping malls and commercial centers, choosing new ones to represent Chinese culture and adhere to the requests of the Communist Party. At the moment, it’s unclear whether this will become a full-fledged national phenomenon. In March, the wealthy southern province of Guangdong started collecting names that it deemed to be misaligned with “core socialist v

Dubbed “China’s Silicon Valley,” the southern city of Shenzhen is home to some of the country’s biggest tech companies. And just like San Francisco, a tech boom in Shenzhen has been a curse to those who can’t keep up with rising property prices. But in an attempt to calm public discontent over unaffordable housing and to keep attracting talent, the Chinese tech hub said it would build one million subsidized homes by 2035. Shenzhen is seeking to adopt a housing model that, if successful, could be replicated in other major Chinese cities struggling to avert a housing crisis. “Shenzhen would like to be a pioneer seeking a scheme more like Singapore, separating more affordable homes to average i

North Korea may have threatened to cancel an upcoming summit with President Trump, but Chinese property buyers have been putting their money on peace. Dandong, a small Chinese city bordering North Korea, saw the biggest surge in prices for new properties last month, the highest among 70 cities surveyed in China, according to figures from China’s Bureau of Statistics. Average prices in the city jumped by 2%. Since late April, Dandong’s property prices have skyrocketed, after North Korea extended an olive branch to South Korea and the United States.  Home buyers from across China have been flocking there to buy into the possibility of a peace dividend. North Korea has promised to work toward d

For Chinese real estate speculators, the hottest investment these days is an apartment with a view of North Korea. The northeastern Chinese border city of Dandong, Liaoning province has seen home prices skyrocket in the past few weeks, as investors bet on a growing North Korean economy. Most of the trade between China and North Korea passes through Dandong, a small city that sits across the Yalu River from the impoverished North Korean city of Sinuiju. With peace talks starting between Pyongyang and Seoul, Chinese buyers are flocking to the trading hub to seize on what they believe to be a golden opportunity. Prices for new homes in the city’s New Zone surged from about $44 per square foot