The restrictive housing purchase policy is expected to further loosen, with nearly 20 cities relaxing housing purchase restrictions | Policy | Home Purchase

Recently, many regions in China have adjusted and relaxed restrictive home purchase policies.

On the 26th, the Housing and Urban Rural Development Bureau of Lianyungang City, Jiangsu Province, issued 9 measures to further optimize real estate policies. This mainly involves optimizing housing provident fund loans and withdrawals, reducing the down payment ratio of the first housing provident fund from 30% to 20%, continuing to provide housing subsidies, extending the payment deadline for land transfer fees, and promoting "housing ticket" resettlement.

On the 25th, Yangzhou City in Jiangsu Province issued a new policy stating that starting from July 1st, those who purchase improved housing in the urban area will no longer be subject to the purchase restriction policy, and their original housing will no longer be subject to the sales restriction policy, with a validity period of one year. This is about four months after the introduction of the new real estate policy in February this year, Yangzhou City has once again taken the initiative to adjust and optimize local real estate policies. After two adjustments, the purchase and sales restrictions in the Yangzhou real estate market have been basically lifted.

An official document released on June 15th in Fuqing City, Fujian Province stated that those who purchase newly-built commercial housing in the city will no longer be subject to resale restrictions. Starting from July 2017, following the practice in Fuzhou, it is stipulated that only housing with a purchase contract signed for at least 2 years and a real estate ownership certificate obtained can be transferred. Fuqing City has also become the first city this year to officially announce the cancellation of housing sales restrictions.

More than 300 policies have been introduced in over a hundred regions this year

According to statistics from Zhongzhi Research Institute, since 2023, more than 100 places have introduced real estate regulation policies more than 300 times. Among them, nearly 20 cities such as Jinan, Changsha, and Xiamen have relaxed their purchase restriction policies, and some hot second tier cities such as Hangzhou have introduced policy optimization and purchase restriction measures multiple times.

The number of cities that have relaxed loan and sales restrictions has also increased.

Since last year, many cities have relaxed their restrictions on sales. According to incomplete statistics from Zhuge Data Research Center, as of mid June this year, more than 20 cities including Zhengzhou, Qingdao, Suzhou, Jinhua, Nanjing, Changzhou, Dongguan, Xi'an, etc. have relaxed their sales restrictions. The cities that have lifted sales restrictions include Harbin, Changzhou, Langfang, Quzhou, Fuqing, and a few other cities, most of which are third - and fourth tier cities.

The adaptability of restrictive housing purchase policies has decreased

Administrative and restrictive housing policies, represented by purchase restrictions, loan restrictions, sales restrictions, and price limits, were once seen as the "killer weapon" in the toolbox of real estate market regulation in various regions. However, as the Chinese real estate market enters a new stage, the industry generally believes that it is difficult for the Chinese real estate market to reproduce its past rapid development.

At present, the pressure of adjustment in many real estate markets is increasing, facing slow recovery of market confidence and decreased transaction activity. The adaptability of restrictive home purchase policies has decreased when implementing urban policies.

Chen Wenjing, Director of Market Research at Zhongzhi Research Institute, pointed out that currently, the stabilization of the real estate market is still influenced and constrained by multiple factors:

One is that the macroeconomic situation is facing significant pressure, and the income expectations of residents have not yet shown a significant improvement.

Secondly, the prices of new and second-hand houses have not returned to the upward trend, and homebuyers still have expectations of a decline in housing prices.

The third issue is that homebuyers are still concerned about the unfinished properties, and some real estate companies are under significant debt repayment pressure, which has also caused disturbance to market expectations.

Opening up more cities in the second half of the year to promote market recovery

Chen Wenjing believes that in the second half of the year, more cities may gradually loosen restrictive policies to promote market stability and recovery, especially ordinary second tier and third - and fourth tier cities.

According to the Kerui Research Center, in the first half of the year, many regions relaxed restrictive home purchase policies. Among them, 14 cities including Guangzhou and Changsha have relaxed purchase restrictions; Hunan Province and more than ten cities including Qingdao and Hefei have relaxed loan restrictions; Seven cities including Shenzhen and Guiyang have relaxed price limits; Zhengzhou, Xiamen and other cities have relaxed sales restrictions.

Looking ahead to the future, the Kerui Research Center believes that local real estate regulation policies may continue to relax, and first tier cities as well as strong second tier cities such as Hangzhou and Chengdu are expected to further lift transaction restrictions to support rigid and improved housing demand;

Third - and fourth tier cities may fully lift administrative restrictions on purchasing houses, increase financial and tax support policies such as housing vouchers, purchase subsidies, and deed tax reductions. Except for a few strong third tier cities, the institution believes that other cities can consider fully lifting restrictive policies such as purchase and loan restrictions.