Property Market

Property market growth not bubble

By Hu Yuanyuan (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2009-12-05 17:46

China's property market is not facing big risks in the short term despite a rapid growing real estate price in some key cities this year, industry experts said at a national forum today.

"A key indicator to judge the scale of the property bubble is to see the financial leverage of mortgage and property developers' debt ratio," Teng Tai, managing director of China Galaxy Securities Companies Limited, said at the CIHAF 2009, the country's largest professional real estate expo.

"In China, the financial leverage of home purchase is still under control and is not likely to trigger a crisis like the ones US and Dubai experienced."

The property prices in China's major cities, such as Beijing and Shanghai, has seen growth of more than 50 percent this year, thus leading to concerns that the country will have a big bubble in the real estate sector.

"One of the major measures that government should take to curb the fast growing property price is to pump more land supply into the market and construct more affordable housing and low-rent housing for low-income families," said Chen Huai, dean of the policy research office of the ministry of housing and urban-rural construction.

During the three-day expo, a land promotion forum was also held, with more than 10 cities over the country, including Beijing, Rizhao and Qingdao offering many primary land parcels for auction. The cities also brought their flagship property projects to the expo. Hainan province, for instance, brought opportunities for land from Phoenix Island, the most expensive project in Sanya with sales prices ranging from 50,000 yuan to 100,000 yuan per sq m.