Recently, the four first-tier cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen have released a report card on property market transactions during the National Day holiday, and the transaction volume of both new and second-hand houses has increased sharply year-on-year.
Nandu reporters paid attention to the fact that with the first mention of the meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee to "promote the real estate market to stop falling and stabilize", as well as the relaxation of purchase restrictions in first-tier cities, the reduction of down payments and interest rates, etc., first-tier cities ushered in a boom in buying houses during the National Day, and some people even bought 10 sets at a time in Guangzhou.
In the face of this property market boom, some second-hand landlords have raised their psychological expectations and increased prices by taking advantage of the trend; Some users who just need to be confused and are not sure about the timing of entry. So, can the policy heat be sustained? Will house prices stop falling and stabilize? Can the house be "on the bus" now? In the face of all kinds of questions, some experts said that in the future, there will be regional differentiation in housing prices, and there are still opportunities for large population inflows into cities.
A newly built community in Chengguan District, Lanzhou City. Xinhua News Agency data map
How to understand the decline and stability? Experts believe that the focus is on stopping the fall
Nandu reporters paid attention to the fact that topics related to the real estate market have become "frequent visitors" to the meetings of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, and since the beginning of this year, there have been three meetings of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee to mention real estate.
Specifically, the meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee held on April 30 proposed to continue to adhere to city-specific policies, consolidate the responsibilities of local governments, real estate enterprises and financial institutions, and earnestly do a good job in ensuring the delivery of housing to protect the legitimate rights and interests of buyers. It is necessary to combine the new changes in the relationship between supply and demand in the real estate market and the new expectations of the people for high-quality housing, and make overall plans to study and digest the stock of real estate and optimize the policy measures for incremental housing.
The meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee held on July 30 mentioned that it is necessary to implement new policies to promote the steady and healthy development of the real estate market, adhere to the combination of digesting the stock and optimizing the increment, actively support the acquisition of the stock of commercial housing for affordable housing, further do a good job in ensuring the delivery of housing, and accelerate the construction of a new model of real estate development.
The meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China held on September 26 went further, proposing for the first time to promote the real estate market to stop falling and stabilizing, and specifically pointed out that it is necessary to promote the real estate market to stop falling and stabilize, strictly control the increment of commercial housing construction, optimize the stock, improve the quality, increase the "white list" project loans, and support the revitalization of the stock of idle land. It is necessary to respond to the concerns of the masses, adjust the housing purchase restriction policy, reduce the interest rate of the stock of housing loans, pay close attention to improving the land, fiscal and taxation, financial and other policies, and promote the construction of a new model of real estate development.
After the term "stop falling and stabilizing" was proposed, it aroused widespread concern in the society, and the question of the public was: "Can housing prices really stop falling and stabilize?" ”
In this regard, Zhang Dawei, chief analyst of Centaline Real Estate, told reporters that at present, there are two understandings of stopping the decline and stabilizing, one understanding is that housing prices have stopped falling, and the decline has slowed down or slowed down significantly; Another way to understand this is that house prices have stabilized or even risen. "I think the focus of the current policy is to stop the decline in house prices, and the probability of house prices rising is not very high."
In addition, the reporter of Nandu noticed that since late September, a series of real estate easing measures have been accelerated, in addition to the first meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee to promote the real estate to stop falling and stabilize, the central bank's financial policy "four arrows at the same time", cut the reserve requirement, cut interest rates, reduce down payments, reduce the interest rate of the stock of housing loans, causing concern.
When it comes to the interest rate of the stock mortgage, Zhang Dawei believes that the reduction of the interest rate of the stock mortgage will have little impact on the real estate market in the short term, because people who have bought a house are unlikely to buy a house in the short term.
The site of an opening project in Jiading District, Shanghai. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Zheng Juntian
Can the "policy fever" continue? There is still room for policy release in the future
After the release of the central government's favorable signal, since late September, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Shanghai, and Beijing have successively issued new policies for the property market, among which Guangzhou has completely canceled purchase restrictions, and Shenzhen, Shanghai, and Beijing have relaxed purchase restrictions and lowered the down payment ratio. Immediately, during the National Day, the first-tier cities set off a house viewing fever and transaction fever, and handed over a dazzling report card:
Seven days before the National Day holiday, the transaction volume in Guangzhou has reached 3,100 sets, with a daily average of 443 sets, about 2.4 times that of the same period last year;
1,841 new houses were subscribed and sold in Shenzhen, with a year-on-year increase of 664.14%; 1,314 second-hand houses were sold by leading intermediaries, with a year-on-year increase of 339% in average daily value;
The transaction area of new commercial residential buildings in Shanghai was 64,400 square meters, an increase of 85.06% year-on-year, and 2,133 second-hand houses were contracted, an increase of 100.47% year-on-year;
The cumulative subscription of new residential buildings in Beijing is close to 2,000 units, an increase of nearly 3 times compared with the transaction of about 600 units during the 2023 National Day holiday; The actual transaction of second-hand houses reached about 5,500 units, a year-on-year increase of more than 175%.
However, in Zhang Dawei's view, the above data are compared with the same period last year, because the data of the same period last year is poor, so the sharp increase in data needs to be more sober thinking.
Looking back at China's property market in 2018, due to the long-term overheating situation, housing prices at that time were still at a high level, and many places, especially first-tier cities, introduced strict purchase restriction policies. The reporter compared the data of Beijing's property market transactions from October 1 to 10, 2018, according to the statistics of Leju Buying, at that time, under the condition that the real estate market also implemented policies such as purchase restrictions, 1,650 new houses in Beijing were signed online, and 2,109 sets of second-hand houses were signed online.
According to the observation of many experts, since the beginning of this year, as soon as the new real estate market policy is introduced, it will drive the enthusiasm of the property market. However, the last round of "517" policy only brought a "pulse" rebound in May and June, and the transaction volume of new and second-hand houses in June increased month-on-month and was stronger than the seasonality, which led to the narrowing of the year-on-year decline in housing transactions in the first half of the year, but the transaction of new houses in July and August fell, and the "Golden Nine" was no more, and the policy effect was subsided.
Some people in the industry believe that the effect of this "squeezing toothpaste" relaxation policy is short-term pulsive and unsustainable.
So, how long will this policy fever last? Zhang Dawei believes that it is necessary to continue to pay attention to it for a period of time to see the situation half a month after the introduction of the new policy, and it is expected that there will be loose policies in the future.
Ren Zeping, an economist and founder of Zeping Macro, also publicly said that the relaxation of policies in first-tier cities has the significance of a weather vane, and it is expected that first-tier cities will continue to increase new policies according to the situation until the property market stops falling and stabilizes.
Can you "get on board" now? In the future, there will be opportunities in first-tier cities
Nandu reporters noticed that the introduction of this round of new policies has also changed the psychological expectations of buyers and sellers of houses.
According to public reports, after the introduction of the new policy, some landlords jumped 500,000 yuan overnight. Pacific real estate agent publicly said about this incident that it is rare to jump the price by 500,000 yuan, but there are indeed cases around him where the landlord raised the price by 100,000 yuan and finally the customer agreed.
Some experts said that the above situation is not the mainstream, and the current mainstream is still to exchange price for quantity.
At the same time, there are also a number of young people who have not planned to buy a house told the reporter of Nandu: "Overnight, I suddenly have the qualification to buy a house in a first-tier city, but whether the time to get on the car is right now, we have to see again." ”
In this regard, Zhang Dawei said that the relationship between supply and demand in the real estate market in the mainland has undergone profound changes. Except for a few areas where real estate still has a certain investment value, houses in most areas will return to the attributes of commodities and consumer goods. For people who just need to buy a house, they can consider "getting on the bus", "buy early and enjoy early, and buy late with discounts." ”
From the perspective of the long-term trend of real estate, Su Jian, a professor at the School of Economics of Peking University, told reporters that China's population is generally declining, and the main determinant of housing prices is population.
"Of course, it is also necessary to distinguish between first-tier cities, second- and third-tier cities, and small cities. Although the population is declining, China's population geography will gradually adjust in the coming period. Su Jian also said that urbanization and urbanization are the future development direction of China, big cities have more employment opportunities, farmers may directly cross the small cities to gather in large cities, if the household registration system is also reformed in the future, housing prices in first-tier cities may still have opportunities.
Written by: Nandu reporter Yang Wenjun from Beijing