More than 200 cities have implemented the "subsidy" policy, but there are still difficulties in cashing in and the problem of untimely distribution

China Times

2024-04-10 12:58Published on the official account of Beijing China Times

Reporter Li Beibei reports from Shanghai

In order to further promote the release of housing demand, many cities such as Rizhao in Shandong, Yiwu in Zhejiang, Lishui in Zhejiang, Luohe in Henan, and Lijiang in Yunnan have recently intensively implemented housing purchase subsidy measures, forming a wave of stabilizing the property market. At present, the real estate market in some cities has shown obvious signs of recovery.

The housing subsidy policy aims to promote the healthy development of the real estate market. However, in the actual operation process, there are problems in some areas that it is difficult to cash out the housing purchase subsidy and the issuance is not timely, which has aroused public concern.

In this regard, Zhang Dawei, chief analyst of Centaline Real Estate, bluntly said that the local implementation of housing subsidies is not a good policy. He stressed to the "China Times" reporter that there are two embarrassing situations in the house purchase subsidy. First, the amount of housing purchase subsidy is small, which is "of little significance" to promote consumers' housing purchase behavior, and the current local financial pressure is large; if the amount of housing purchase subsidy is high, it is easy to produce high housing prices and down payment fraud in disguise. "If you seriously pursue it, this is a disguised violation. ”

"Fancy" housing subsidies stabilize the property market

At the beginning of April, according to online news, the Housing and Urban-Rural Development Bureau of Rizhao City, Shandong Province organized a "Several Measures to Promote the Stable and Healthy Development of the Real Estate Market in Rizhao City". It is mentioned that for the rural transfer population within the jurisdiction of Rizhao City to buy the first commercial housing (including new commercial housing and second-hand houses acquired by development enterprises "trade-in", the subsidy amount is 20% of the purchase price. Subsequently, the online information was confirmed by the Rizhao Municipal Bureau of Housing and Urban-Rural Development.

The reporter saw that on March 25 this year, the Rizhao Municipal Bureau of Housing and Urban-Rural Development issued the above documents. According to the document, it is stipulated that eligible new citizens (including urban and rural families with two children and above), young talents, etc., can apply for the subsidy of the government's housing purchase vouchers, the subsidy amount is 20% of the total purchase price, and the vouchers can be used to offset 50% of the down payment if they purchase an existing house and apply for a certificate directly.

Such a strong housing subsidy has an immediate effect on the Rizhao property market. It is understood that at present, a number of real estate projects in Rizhao have announced the implementation of the preferential measures. According to local media reports, the number of people who come to see the house in Rizhao City has increased several times in recent days compared with before, and the transaction volume has also risen sharply, and there is even a phenomenon of "grabbing houses" in some real estate.

The housing subsidy policy has always been an important means for local and city-specific policies. In the downward stage of the property market, in order to further promote the release of housing demand, in addition to Rizhao in Shandong, Tongcheng in Anhui, Yiwu in Zhejiang, Lishui in Zhejiang, Luohe in Henan, Lijiang in Yunnan and other cities have increased the issuance of housing subsidies, in order to subsidize the down payment, deed tax and other ways to advance, some of the property market has shown signs of recovery.

For example, on April 1, the Lishui Economic and Technological Development Zone issued the "Lishui Economic and Technological Development Zone Housing Purchase Consumption Voucher Issuance and Use Plan", linking various real estate enterprises for sale to carry out promotional activities, and deducting 10% of the down payment by issuing nearly 10 million yuan of housing purchase consumption vouchers. According to the official WeChat account of Lishui Economic and Technological Development Zone, the first house purchase voucher was born on the first day of the implementation of the policy, which was worth a down payment of 330,000 yuan.

On the same day that the official Weibo released the news, several real estate projects in the Economic Development Zone of Lishui City also released red posters. For example, Yongjin Star launched an advertising slogan of "10% down payment can be directly deducted with house purchase vouchers", and Zhong'an Chenyue Mingdi launched a promotional campaign of "10% house purchase subsidy for a limited time, with a maximum saving of about 190,000 yuan".

On April 2, Yiwu, Zhejiang Province issued a notice to launch the "house ticket" subsidy method for five groups: talent home buyers, first-time home buyers, multi-child families, agglomeration resettlement objects, and urban organic renewal requisitioned and relocated households. Among them, for first-time home buyers, individuals and their spouses who do not have commercial housing in Yiwu can purchase first-hand commercial housing with a construction area of less than 150 square meters and a total record price of no more than 3.5 million yuan within the specified time, and will be subsidized in the form of "house tickets" at 1,000 yuan per square meter. At the same time, for multi-child families, the subsidy is 100,000 yuan for two-child families and 200,000 yuan for three-child families, and the subsidy is issued in the form of "room tickets".

On April 7, in order to increase the preferential treatment for house purchase and reduce the burden of buying a house for the masses, Lijiang Ancient Town of Yunnan Province announced that from October 21, 2023 to December 31, 2024, buyers who purchase newly built commercial housing in the ancient city and handle it within the housing purchase subsidy period will be calculated according to 50% of the deed tax paid as the housing purchase subsidy standard, and the subsidy limit for a single house shall not exceed 20,000 yuan.

Experts: Commitments need to be strengthened

According to the statistics of the China Index Institute, since 2022, more than 200 cities have issued more than 300 policies related to housing purchase subsidies, mainly including one-time subsidies according to sets or areas, one-time or installment payment of deed tax subsidies, subsidies for the issuance of consumption vouchers, housing purchase subsidies for talents, and subsidies for a certain proportion of the purchase price. The industry generally believes that the housing subsidy policy can effectively reduce the cost of buying a house, especially the form of subsidies such as housing vouchers directly used for the down payment, and it is expected that more regions will continue to introduce favorable policies for the property market.

However, it should be noted that in the actual operation process, some cities and regions have successively encountered problems such as difficulty in cashing out housing subsidies and untimely issuance. Recently, the phenomenon of difficulty in cashing out housing subsidies for talents in Zhongmu, Henan and Shucheng, Anhui has been highly concerned by the public. Prior to this, similar situations occurred in Ruzhou City, Henan Province, Puyang County, Puyang City, Fushun County, Sichuan Province, Lezhi County, Ziyang City, and other places.

For example, at the end of March this year, a netizen in Shucheng County, Lu'an City, Anhui Province, reported on the leadership message board of People's Daily Online that he purchased a residential house in Shucheng County in September 2022, and passed the sixth batch of publicity of the 2023 Shucheng County Talent Housing Purchase Subsidy in March 2023. It has been more than 1 year since the announcement time, and the 40,000 yuan housing subsidy has not yet been received.

In this regard, the Supervision and Assessment Office of the Shucheng County People's Government of Shucheng County Party Committee replied that due to objective reasons such as the current financial pressure, the progress of the issuance of housing subsidies for talents in Shucheng County is relatively slow, and it has been issued to the fourth batch of No. 75 in the order of publicity. The next step is still according to the amount of funds in place, and they will be distributed in the order of publicity, and gradually cashed out. Due to the uncertainty of the availability of financial funds, it is not possible to predict the timing of the release of the remaining batches. However, the local government stressed that it will do its best to solve the problem of difficulty in cashing out the housing purchase subsidy and protect the legitimate rights and interests of home buyers.

Li Yujia, chief researcher at the Housing Policy Research Center of the Guangdong Provincial Academy of Urban and Rural Planning, believes that there are many reasons why subsidies cannot be paid in a timely manner. For example, policymakers may not fully consider fiscal sustainability when introducing new policies, putting excessive financial pressure on local governments, or they may initially set aside a budget but later divert funds to ensure the operation of the grassroots and other government projects, resulting in timely subsidies.

Bai Wenxi, vice chairman of the China Enterprise Capital Alliance, said that it is difficult to cash out the housing purchase subsidy and the issuance is not timely, which will have a certain impact on the confidence of home buyers and market stability.

"Local subsidies for housing purchases are not a good idea. Zhang Dawei, chief analyst of Centaline Real Estate, said bluntly. He explained to the "China Times" reporter that the house purchase subsidy is generally divided into "pre-payment", which can be used as a down payment, but in fact, this move is suspected of violating the law, "because the buyer's down payment must be his own funds";

At present, some cities and regions have successively encountered problems such as difficulty in cashing out housing subsidies and untimely issuance. Zhang Dawei further analyzed and pointed out that there are two embarrassing situations in the housing purchase subsidy. First, the amount of housing purchase subsidy is small, which is "of little significance" to promote consumers' housing purchase behavior, and the current local financial pressure is large; if the amount of housing purchase subsidy is high, it is easy to produce high housing prices and down payment fraud in disguise. "If you seriously pursue it, this is a disguised violation. ”

In this regard, Bai Wenxi suggested that the implementation of the housing subsidy policy needs to comprehensively consider many factors and prescribe the right medicine. For example, in view of problems such as insufficient implementation or unclear processes, shortage of funds or poor management, and opaque supervision, it is necessary to ensure the smooth implementation of policies by strengthening policy implementation, improving the efficiency of fund management, enhancing regulatory transparency, and reasonably managing market expectations.

Editor-in-charge: Zhang Bei Editor-in-chief: Zhang Yuning