Housing prices in county towns are "30,000 yuan", and property market regulation has spread to third- and fourth-tier cities and top 100 counties
A 133-square-meter top floor hard-covered house was sold at 37,000 yuan per square meter for a total price of 5 million yuan.
The transaction that took place in early August was neither in Shanghai nor Hangzhou, but in Quzhou, a fourth-tier city in western Zhejiang Province, at the junction of the four provinces of Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi, and Anhui.
A few days later, on August 7, the Office of the Coordination Group for the Sustainable and Healthy Development of the Real Estate Market in Quzhou issued the "Notice on Further Promoting the Stable and Healthy Development of the Urban Real Estate Market."
This fourth-tier town, whose housing prices are approaching that of first- and second-tier cities, has once again upgraded its regulatory policies.
On August 10, another member of the "control army" was added-Yiwu, the top 100 county in the country with the second highest house price in the country and the top 100 county in Zhejiang.
The leading group for the stable and healthy development of the real estate market in Yiwu issued a notice on August 10 stating that it will further strengthen the regulation of the real estate market in Yiwu, from optimizing land supply, strengthening quality control, formulating housing and land price joint review and filing systems, and implementing "notarization lottery" to support The demand for self-occupation, the adjustment of the residential sales restriction policy, and strict management of name changes, etc. proceeded to ensure the stable and healthy development of the local real estate market.
As a county-level city under the jurisdiction of Jinhua City, many housing prices in Yiwu have entered the "30,000 Era".
According to the national housing prices released by the China Real Estate Association, Yiwu continued to rank first in Zhejiang county housing prices with an average price of 29,523 yuan per square meter, which also strongly increased the overall housing prices in Jinhua City.
Not only Yiwu, but many counties in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, such as Jiangshan and Yongkang, are contributing more and more "30,000+" housing.
House prices in county towns are "30,000 yuan"
As one of the few fourth-tier cities in Zhejiang, Quzhou’s housing prices have caught up with first- and second-tier cities, which also contrasts with Quzhou’s economic level, which ranks low in Zhejiang Province.
On the national house price quotation website, the listing price in Quzhou in July 2021 was 18,117 yuan per square meter, which was almost the same as the listing prices in Chengdu and Xi'an during the same period, with an average total price of 2.09 million yuan.
This also means that for those who just need to buy a first home, they need to prepare a down payment of at least 600,000 yuan or more.
Up to now, in addition to the above-mentioned case of close to 40,000 yuan per square meter in Kecheng District, Quzhou, there are also many second-hand houses with an average price approaching 30,000 yuan per square meter in the Western District, which has been renamed as "Smart New City". .
How expensive the house prices in Quzhou are can be seen from the house prices in the county towns under its jurisdiction.
In April of this year, after 7 hours of 296 rounds of quotations for the land on the north side of Jiangshan Huangchen Community, Zhejiang Wanrong Hubei Real Estate bid for a total price of 463.66 million yuan, a floor price of 13,987 yuan per square meter, and a premium rate of 76.52%.
The floor price of about 14,000 yuan per square meter set a new record for land prices in Jiangshan.
If it is estimated by 2 times, the average sales price of the new disk will not be less than 28,000 yuan/square meter.
According to the national housing price data, Jiangshan’s housing prices rank among the top ten in the country’s county housing price rankings.
Among the top 20 counties on the list, 75% are located in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and 65% are contributed by Zhejiang.
"Jiangshan has a lot of real estate agencies and their business is pretty good." Zhang Lin, who has been a local real estate agency for 11 years, told China Business News that there are hundreds of real estate agencies in a small county, and new projects are often sold as soon as they are opened. After all, the price of new houses and second-hand houses is more than 20,000 yuan.
Li Long, a business owner who manufactures and sells furniture in Jiangshan City, told CBN that the total price of a row house he bought 10 years ago was 5.8 million yuan, and now it has risen to 22 million yuan, and the unit price is about to exceed 30,000 yuan.
Although housing prices have been rising, the rise has been particularly pronounced in the past two years.
Jiangshan local resident Zhou Xiangbao told China Business News that the average price of a house bought in the first half of last year was about 13,000 yuan per square meter, and it had risen to more than 20,000 in the first half of this year, nearly doubling in a year.
Chai Huaqiang, a local resident who works as a manager for a company in Jiangshan, said that the average price of a house he bought in 2013 has risen to more than 20,000. More than ten thousand yuan".
Behind the high housing prices
The price of the market must be closely related to the relationship between supply and demand.
Yan Yuejin, research director of the Think Tank Center of E-House Research Institute, told China Business News that there are many reasons for high housing prices, and the lack of supply and the surge in demand are often important reasons for the obvious rise in housing prices.
In addition, the economic fundamentals of cities like Quzhou are still good, and the real estate market is also prone to rebound.
"From the actual experience, Quzhou used to provide too little land for real estate, and real estate companies would not buy land. As a result of the increase in demand for house purchases in the past two years, there were relatively few listings. In addition to new houses, there are also fewer sub-new housing projects. ." Yan Yuejin said.
Quzhou, located in the west of Zhejiang Province, can be said to be a city built on a mountain. The urban area is small and distributed along the narrow strip of the local river Qujiang and the Zhegan Railway. It is very different from the Yimapingchuan in the northern and eastern cities of Zhejiang.
From the perspective of permanent population/built-up area, the population density of Quzhou is about 24,100 people per square kilometer, ranking at the bottom in Zhejiang.
This means that the overall land available for residential development in Quzhou is relatively limited, which has also resulted in a relatively scarce residential supply, especially in Jiangshan.
Data show that in 2020, the sales area of commercial housing in Jiangshan City will drop by 48%, making the per capita sales area of commercial housing only 0.34 square meters per person.
In 2019, the per capita sales area of commercial housing in Jiangshan City was only 0.64 square meters per person.
While supply is tight, the demand side is relatively strong and purchasing power is strong.
Zhejiang Province is building a demonstration zone for common prosperity, and even if the total GDP of Quzhou counts down in the province, it is not inferior to the whole country.
At the same time, as an important indicator of the wealth of a place, the per capita disposable income of Quzhou residents is not low.
Statistics show that in 2020, the per capita disposable income of Zhejiang residents exceeds 50,000 yuan, second only to Shanghai nationwide.
The per capita disposable income of residents in Quzhou last year was 37,935 yuan, of which the per capita disposable income of urban and rural residents was 49,300 yuan and 26,290 yuan.
In Jiangshan City, the per capita disposable income of urban permanent residents was higher than that of Quzhou City last year, reaching 51987 yuan.
Coupled with Zhejiang’s strong business atmosphere and long-term tradition of hiding wealth among the people, there are still many more wealthy people in Quzhou than in other third- and fourth-tier cities across the country.
While the purchasing power is strong, the shed reform and credit easing have further boosted housing prices.
From 2016 to 2020, Quzhou shanty towns started construction at 4681 sets, 6335 sets, 15,505 sets, 7392 sets, and 404 sets respectively, for a total of 34317 sets, an average of 6863 sets per year.
The sales area of commercial housing in Quzhou has stabilized at more than 2 million square meters each year.
If calculated by a set of 100 square meters, the number of commercial housing sold annually is more than 20,000 sets.
This means that in the past five years, the average annual number of units started in shanty towns is equivalent to about one-third of the annual number of units sold in commercial housing.
As for Yiwu, it is not to mention hiding wealth among the people.
As the “World Small Commodity Capital” ranked first in the country for per capita disposable income for many years, Yiwu’s per capita disposable income has exceeded 70,000 yuan in 2020, surpassing first-tier cities such as Shanghai and Beijing.
In the first half of this year, the per capita disposable income of urban and rural residents in Yiwu continued to grow, with a year-on-year increase of 13.5%, reaching 40,341 yuan, an average annual growth rate of 7.4% over the two years.
Among them, the per capita disposable income of urban permanent residents was 44,624 yuan, an increase of 13.2%, and an average annual increase of 6.8% in two years; the per capita disposable income of rural residents was 26,003 yuan, an increase of 14.5%, and an average annual increase of 8.9% in two years.
Housing price adjustment and upgrade
Yan Yuejin told China Business News that the further tightening of control policies in Quzhou City can be said to be the direction of policy upgrades in some key third- and fourth-tier cities in the second half of the year. It is expected that the number of relevant regulated cities will continue to increase; while Yiwu represents significant housing and land prices this year. The rising top 100 counties indicate that follow-up policies in such regions will be tightly oriented. It is expected that the real estate regulation in the top 100 counties will also be significantly upgraded.
In order to curb speculation in real estate and curb the rapid rise in housing prices, it is not the first time that Quzhou has upgraded its regulatory policies.
According to the New Deal on the property market on August 7, Quzhou City started from five aspects: implementing purchase restrictions, expanding the scope of sales restrictions, strengthening tax regulation, establishing a reference price release mechanism for second-hand housing transactions, and standardizing second-hand housing listings.
The New Deal clarified that it will suspend the sale of newly-built commercial housing and second-hand housing to non-resident households in the city who own one or more houses within the urban area; for non-resident households in the city without housing, they must continue to pay urban social security or urban social security within the city. After 12 months of personal income tax, one set of newly-built commercial housing or second-hand housing can be purchased within the urban area.
The purchase of newly-built commercial housing of 144 square meters and above within the urban area of Quzhou City shall not be transferred within 5 years from the date of signing and filing the "Commercial Housing Sales Contract" online.
In addition, the New Deal proposes to pilot the establishment of a second-hand housing transaction reference price release mechanism in urban hotspots, with residential communities as the smallest unit to form a second-hand housing transaction reference price, which will be regularly released on the relevant management platform.
Commercial banks issue second-hand housing mortgage loans in strict accordance with the published reference price of second-hand housing transactions as the upper limit.
Regarding the regulation of second-hand housing listings, the New Deal clarified that related concepts such as "school district" should not appear in the listing information of second-hand housing listings.
Real estate brokerage agencies shall not publicly release information on houses whose listed prices are significantly higher than the reasonable transaction prices. Brokerage agencies and practitioners who have maliciously bid up housing prices, take the opportunity to speculate on school district housing, fabricate and spread false statements about rising housing prices, etc., shall be subject to laws and regulations. Measures such as interviews, public notifications, suspension of online signing, and punishment for dishonesty shall be adopted in accordance with regulations, and suspected crimes shall be transferred to judicial organs for handling.
As early as April this year, Kaihua County and Jiangshan City in Quzhou also introduced new real estate control policies.
Among them, the "12 Articles" of the property market regulation issued by Jiangshan proposed the "price limit" transfer policy for the first time.
The “12 Articles” are clear. The transfer of residential land for hot land plots with high market attention will be selected from “limited housing prices, competitive land prices”, “limited housing prices, limited land prices, competitive construction,” “limited housing prices, competitive construction,” and “limited Housing prices, bidding for self-holding", “land price restriction, bidding for self-holding” and other methods are preferred; in the implementation of housing sales restrictions, the hotspots with high market attention should be clarified before land transfer. The contract shall not be transferred within 5 years from the date of signing and filing the contract online.
In order to curb unreasonable housing demand, Jiangshan will conduct special research on the city's real estate market, comprehensively analyze the real estate situation, and timely introduce real estate purchase restrictions to curb unreasonable housing demand.
At the same time, strengthen the pre-sale management of commercial housing, and strictly implement the pre-sale permit policy of commercial housing.
In addition to Quzhou, Jiangshan and Yiwu, Hangzhou, Zhejiang also issued the "Notice on Further Strengthening Regulation and Control of the Real Estate Market" on August 5. This is the third time this year that Hangzhou has increased its precise control over the property market.
Yan Yuejin believes that this year's continued policy control has resulted in the overall real estate market stabilizing and improving, and there has been much less speculation.
Therefore, the recent increase in regulation is actually more reflected in the increased awareness of local governments to actively regulate, and cannot be simply attributed to market chaos such as housing price speculation.
He predicts that as the regulation upgrades gradually from first- and second-tier cities into third- and fourth-tier cities, the probability of subsequent regulatory upgrades in the top 100 counties and county-level cities will continue to increase.
Especially after the three red lines, in order to avoid the risk of land acquisition, some real estate companies went to such cities one after another, resulting in fierce land auctions. This is the content of follow-up regulation that requires active attention.
At the same time, these cities also need to make efforts in land supply and other aspects to better improve the supply-demand relationship in such cities and promote the stable and healthy development of the market.
(Author: Miao Qi)