writing / Leju Finance Li Yihe
These two days, Owen Li's WeChat and circle of friends have exploded.
Last Friday, a series of favorable policies for the property market suddenly lifted the lower limit of commercial loan interest rate, reduced the down payment and the interest rate of provident fund, Each item is related to the immediate interests of buyers, and has triggered the boiling point of the property market.
On the day when the policy came out, Ou Wenli's friends, former would-be buyers, and even some strange friends introduced by her friends occupied her WeChat, and the number of people coming to consult increased significantly.
She is a real estate agent and a mother of two children.
In the past two years or more, the property market has continued to decline, the company's order volume has decreased, and the income has declined. Many colleagues have fled the industry, and Owen Li is still holding on.
Some time ago, she and her husband and two children moved their home farther away from the central area.
Now every morning, Owen needs to drive her two children to the school ten kilometers away, and then go back to work on her own.
Owen Li's answer to the impact of this policy combination is simple: "There will be a wave of young spring."
It is hard to tell whether this is her experience in intermediary industry for many years or the simplest vision in her heart, or both.
The real estate market has been depressed for a long time. During this period, many policies were introduced, but none of them could reverse the market. The real estate market is still going its own way.
After the release of the new policy of the property market, it is understood that, Several real estate projects in Shenzhen, Guangzhou and other places are popular.
In fact, in addition to reducing interest rates and down payments on the demand side, many meetings and policies on the same day also involved real estate boosting measures in terms of housing insurance, commercial housing deconstruction, project financing, and the difficulty relief of real estate enterprises in case of accidents.
It is important to mention that the government can purchase commercial housing as affordable housing according to needs.
This series of combination boxing is called the "epic" policy of the property market.
Real estate market moves
According to the optimization policy on personal housing loans issued by the Central Bank, the notice is clear, The lower limit of interest rate policy for commercial individual housing loans for the first and second homes nationwide will be abolished.
In addition, from May 18, 2024, the interest rate of individual housing provident fund loan will be lowered by 0.25 percentage points. The loan interest rate of the first personal housing provident fund for less than five years (including five years) and more than five years is adjusted to 2.35% and 2.85% respectively; The loan interest rate of the second set of personal housing provident fund for less than five years (including five years) and more than five years is adjusted to not less than 2.775% and 3.325% respectively.
In terms of down payment, for households purchasing commercial housing with loans, the minimum down payment ratio of commercial individual housing loans for the first housing is adjusted to not less than 15%, and the minimum down payment ratio of commercial individual housing loans for the second housing is adjusted to not less than 25%.
It is understood that only one day after the release of the policy, Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, Fuzhou, Chengdu, Changsha, Zhengzhou and other places have started to implement the reduction of individual housing provident fund loan interest rate on May 18.
In terms of Beijing Housing Provident Fund Management Center, the staff said that the original interest rate standard for personal housing provident fund loans issued before May 18, 2024 will still be implemented, and the adjusted interest rate standard for personal housing provident fund loans will be implemented from January 1, 2025. For the personal housing provident fund loans that have been accepted before May 18, 2024 but have not been disbursed and accepted after May 18, 2024 (inclusive), the adjusted personal housing provident fund loan interest rate standard shall be implemented.
Shanghai Provident Fund Management Center has specified that the adjusted interest rate will be implemented for loans issued after May 18, 2024 (inclusive); For the undue personal housing provident fund loan issued before May 18, 2024, if the loan term is within one year (including one year), the loan interest rate will not be adjusted, and the original interest rate will still be implemented from May 18, 2024; If the loan term is more than one year, the original interest rate will still be implemented from May 18, 2024, and the adjusted interest rate will be implemented from January 1, 2025.
According to the news of Hubei Housing Construction, as of the morning of 18th, 17 cities and prefectures in Hubei had all lowered the interest rate of personal housing provident fund loans.
Compared with the previous property market policy, this policy has unprecedented strength, which may be more beneficial to the property market.
Dongguan Securities said in the research report that the lower limit of the down payment ratio of the first and second suites was further lowered, It reached the lowest level in the history of China's housing purchase. At the same time, it is also rare in history that the lower limit of the interest rate for commercial loans for the first and second sets of housing is abolished at the national level. He pointed out that the real estate optimization policy at the central level was further implemented with great efforts, which will have a positive impact on boosting market confidence and stimulating real estate sales.
Huang Lichong, president of Huisheng International Capital, also introduced to Leju Finance that the policy would help buyers borrow money to buy houses. But he also objectively pointed out that the overall help needs to be observed, Now the market is not the problem of high interest costs, but the imbalance between supply and demand and the mismatch between income and housing prices.
Collection, storage and de stocking
In addition to lowering the purchase threshold and cost of buyers at the demand side, the de stocking at the supply side of real estate has also been raised to a new height.
On April 30, the meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee mentioned that it is necessary to combine the new changes in the supply and demand relationship of the real estate market with the new expectations of the people for high-quality housing, We will make a comprehensive study of policies and measures to digest existing housing and optimize incremental housing, We will accelerate the construction of new models for real estate development and promote high-quality development of real estate.
The same as last Friday, the nationwide video conference on housing guarantee and delivery was held in Beijing, and He Lifeng, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Vice Premier of the State Council, also stressed in his speech at the conference that we should continue to adhere to the policy of taking measures in the city, fight the battle against the risk of commercial housing being uncompleted, and solidly promote the key work of housing guarantee and delivery, and digest the stock of commercial housing.
He Lifeng mentioned that the relevant local government should proceed from the reality and properly dispose of the idle residential land that has been transferred by means of recovery, acquisition and other means as appropriate to help real estate enterprises with financial difficulties. Cities with large inventory of commercial housing, The government can purchase some commercial houses at a reasonable price to be used as affordable housing.
Behind this series of key work is that in recent years, with the downturn of the property market, the inventory pressure of commercial housing in various regions has become prominent.
On May 17, Liu Aihua, spokesman of the National Bureau of Statistics, chief economist, and director of the Department of Comprehensive Statistics of National Economy, said that since this year, various regions have been implementing policies based on the city and constantly optimizing the real estate policy. Judging from the main data in the real estate field in April, real estate continues to be in the adjustment period.
Specifically, from January to April, the sales area of new commercial housing was 292.52 million square meters, down 20.2% year on year, including the residential sales area, down 23.8%. The sales volume of newly built commercial housing was 2806.7 billion yuan, down 28.3%, of which the sales volume of residential housing dropped 31.1%.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the area of commercial housing for sale at the end of April was 745.53 million square meters, up 15.7% year on year. Among them, the residential area for sale increased by 24.5%. The property market has returned to the era of high inventory in 2015, and even this number has exceeded the historical high of 718.53 million square meters in 2015.
For each city, according to Kerui's data and the average monthly turnover of urban commercial residential buildings in the first 12 months, by the end of April 2024, there are 52 cities in 128 cities in China with a narrow inventory reduction cycle of more than 36 months, accounting for 40%. In addition, there are 60 cities where the cycle of inventory reduction of commercial residential buildings is between 18 (excluding) and 36 months.
The government began to purchase and destock the next time. Bank of China Securities believes that the current policy focuses on the supply and demand sides to digest the inventory, With the continuous increase of policy strength, the pressure of de transformation may be relieved.
Huang Lichong also interpreted Leju Finance from many aspects. He said that in the context of the current downturn in China's real estate market, the upper level encouraged local governments to purchase commercial housing as affordable housing, aiming to stabilize the real estate market by reducing the housing inventory in the market. This policy can stabilize the property market in the short term, but its long-term effect and sustainability depend on many factors.
first, This policy can directly reduce the number of houses for sale in the market, thus helping to stabilize or increase house prices. For real estate developers, this can ease capital pressure, reduce debt risk, and help enterprises stabilize in the short term. In addition, the transformation into affordable housing can also improve the living conditions of low-income families, which is positive from the perspective of social policy.
However, the implementation of this policy needs a lot of financial support. If the central government does not provide sufficient financial assistance, local governments may be unable to implement large-scale acquisition plans due to insufficient funds. The financial situation of local governments varies greatly, and it may be difficult for regions with insufficient financial capacity to effectively implement this policy. In addition, in the long run, it may not be a sustainable strategy to only rely on the government to purchase commercial housing to stabilize the market. The healthy development of the real estate market needs to rely on the market mechanism and the natural growth of consumer demand.
New development model of Heli
It can be seen that this new policy is not a single department, unilaterally implemented in isolation, but a multi sector joint and comprehensive measures to boost the property market, from the supply side, demand side, project financing, real estate enterprises to solve difficulties, and even to ensure the delivery of buildings, All efforts should be made to promote real estate into a new development model.
It is understood that the central bank will set up 300 billion yuan of affordable housing refinancing to encourage and guide financial institutions to follow the principles of marketization and rule of law, Support local state-owned enterprises to purchase commercial houses that have been built but not sold at a reasonable price, It is used as affordable housing for allotment or rent.
The Ministry of Natural Resources also expressed support for local governments to issue special bonds to recover idle land at a reasonable price for affordable housing construction in accordance with the principle of "purchase on demand". In order to further digest the stock properties by controlling the potential supply in the future.
On the other hand, on May 17, the Information Office of the State Council held a regular briefing on the policies of the State Council and pointed out that, We should fight hard to ensure the delivery of commercial housing projects and prevent the risk of uncompleted tail. In accordance with the principles of marketization and rule of law, the commercial housing projects under construction that have been sold but not delivered shall be disposed by category, the project construction delivery shall be promoted, and the legitimate rights and interests of house buyers shall be effectively guaranteed.
The meeting pointed out that the role of urban real estate financing coordination mechanism should be further played to meet the reasonable financing needs of real estate projects. The city government promotes projects that meet the requirements of the "white list" to "make progress as much as possible", and commercial banks "make full use of loans" for projects that meet the requirements of the "white list" to meet the reasonable financing needs of projects under construction. It is understood that as of May 16, 297 cities at prefecture level and above in China have established a real estate financing coordination mechanism, and commercial banks have approved the loan amount of 935 billion yuan for "white list" projects according to the internal approval process.
For a series of real estate blockbuster policies, Dongguan Securities said that it is expected that the main direction of the policy will be to further liberalize purchase restrictions, relax settlement, optimize the "old for new", "digest the stock of real estate", and "optimize the incremental housing" in the future. In particular, the expectation that more local governments will accept houses with storage capacity as affordable housing has been raised. This is for the de stocking of the real estate market and the promotion of "affordable housing" + The new real estate development model of "commercial housing" dual track system will bring more direct and rapid effects to repair the real estate market and the fundamentals of real estate enterprises.
Guolian Securities also pointed out that in 2024, the relationship between supply and demand in the real estate market will change, and the policy keynote will gradually shift to the supply side. They believe that the policy tone may shift to "de stocking" and "old for new" mode, The new model of real estate development is expected to accelerate its implementation.
The impact of the policy has first been reflected in the stock market. In fact, since May 16, the real estate sector and the real estate chain sector have seen a collective rise. Many stocks have closed their trading limits, which has even led to the collective rise of the three major indexes of Hong Kong stocks.
At the close of last Friday (May 17), Hong Kong shares Jingrui Holdings led the rise with 238.1%, and more than 10 real estate stocks such as Yuegang Bay Holdings, Guorui Health, Jianye Real Estate, Landmark Holdings, Yuzhou Group, Rongchuang China, Yajule, Times China and Hongyang Real Estate rose more than 20%. In terms of A-share, Greenland Holdings, Rong'an Real Estate, Jindi Group, Tianjin Investment Chengkai, Joy City, Poly Development, Vanke A, Huaxia Happiness and more than a dozen other stocks rose by the limit.
(Ouwenli is a pseudonym)
