The situation of the real estate market has always been the focus of everyone’s attention. The stable and healthy development of the real estate market is crucial to stabilizing the expectations of home buyers and promoting residential consumption. On May 17, the National Bureau of Statistics released the changes in the sales prices of commercial housing in 70 large and medium-sized cities in April, which attracted attention. How is the property market headed this year? Can the property market break out of the downturn? How do buyers and sellers feel?
After a year of sluggishness, the property market finally ushered in a “little spring” in the first quarter of this year. In March, the number of cities with rising house prices reached the highest peak in nearly four years. However, the statistics just released on May 17 show that after the market soared in the first quarter, the number of cities in which the prices of new and second-hand housing rose month-on-month in 70 cities in April decreased compared with the previous month, and the prices of new and second-hand housing both recorded month-on-month increases. narrow. During the “May 1st” holiday, the overall performance of the real estate sales market was flat. According to statistics, the transaction scale of representative cities increased by about 25% compared with last year’s “May 1st” holiday. The year-on-year decline was still more than 20%.
The reporter’s recent visits and surveys found that the overall recovery of the property market has improved since the beginning of this year, and buyers’ expectations have improved, but the foundation is not yet solid. Entering the second quarter, as the backlog of housing demand in the previous period is basically released, the property market has entered a period of normalization. To promote the healthy development of residential consumption, it is still necessary to continue to optimize relevant regulatory policies, and all parties will work together to enhance confidence in home ownership.
“Xiaoyangchun” conveys warmth
“It was very busy in February and March, but now it is stable again. This is because the customers who are anxious to buy houses have already sold out, and there are customers now, but the demand is not urgent.” On May 4, the reporter came to a housing agency store outside the West Fourth Ring Road in Beijing , The store manager is holding a meeting with dozens of shop assistants to review the work situation during the “May Day” holiday. The manager told the reporter, “During the ‘May 1st’ holiday, there were more customers visiting houses than usual on weekdays, but fewer than usual on weekends. After all, it was the first long holiday after the Spring Festival, and many people went out for travel.”
Regarding the signing of the store in the past six months, the manager said, “From November last year to the end of last year, a number of house purchase needs were put on hold due to the impact of the new crown epidemic. By February and March this year, the needs of customers who rushed to the last train to enter the school were released intensively. Every year there will be In this phenomenon, there are relatively few houses and relatively many customers at that time, and many customers will choose to buy houses that are usually not easy to sell, such as top floors, one-story houses, and one-bedroom houses.”
The property market in Beijing is dominated by second-hand housing, which is a matchmaking transaction. The transaction is affected by many factors. It is very important that the house price is close to the market average price and that the buyers and sellers agree with each other. Even if the market conditions are good, excessive pricing will still hinder transactions. Just like the example given by the manager, there was a two-bedroom apartment of nearly 120 square meters in a community near Yongdinghe Road outside the West Fourth Ring Road in Beijing. When it was launched at the end of last year, the listing price was 9.2 million yuan. Later, the market fell back and the owner did not cut the price in place. Finally, after waiting for half a year, it was sold at a price of 8.8 million yuan on May 3 this year.
The real estate market ushered in recovery after adjusting and optimizing the epidemic prevention and control policies, and the second-hand housing market in Beijing recovered relatively quickly. Leng Hui, an analyst at Beijing Lianjia Research Institute, said, “The online signing data is slightly lagging behind. From the relatively real-time data of Lianjia, it can be seen that the market has recovered in the first half of January this year, and the process was temporarily interrupted in the second half of the month due to the Spring Festival holiday. February The Spring Festival holiday is over, and the backlog of demand due to the epidemic and the Spring Festival in the early stage is released intensively, and the market heat rises rapidly, and is transmitted from the central area of the city to the peripheral areas such as Changping, Shunyi, and Daxing. By March, as the demand is gradually released, the transaction rhythm follows Slowing down, the market was in a slow decline throughout March and the first half of April, and the transaction volume decreased week by week. By the second half of April, the transaction rhythm basically returned to the normal period level.”
In terms of prices, the average transaction price of second-hand housing in Beijing rose slightly in the first quarter compared with the previous period. The reason, Lenghui believes, “After the adjustment and optimization of the epidemic prevention and control measures, the increase in the proportion of transactions in the central urban area has led to a structural increase; the backlog of demand in the early stage has been concentrated in the market, resulting in an imbalance between supply and demand in some areas. Expectations have returned, and prices in some areas have shown signs of falling.”
The reporter learned from the interview that the rhythm of the national property market this year is similar to that of Beijing. “Since last year, various policy measures such as guaranteeing the delivery of buildings, ensuring people’s livelihood, and ensuring stability have effectively protected the legitimate rights and interests of home buyers, and the rational financing of real estate companies has also been improved, bringing about an overall restoration of the market in the first quarter of this year.” Shell Liu Lijie, a market analyst at the Research Institute, said, “From the perspective of the national property market, the demand has been released after February, and the transaction volume has recovered significantly. In March, there was a slight correction from the February high. Overall, the recovery trend in the first quarter was obvious compared with last year.”
“I really feel that the market is very hot.” The person in charge of Longfor Chengdu’s marketing introduced, “The just-needed market has just started to pick up, and most of them are young customers. In the middle and late February, improvement customers entered the market. A total of 40 sets of villa products were sold, exceeding the total sales in the fourth quarter of last year.”
“Currently house buyers pay more attention to the quality of the house, the design of the apartment, the strength of the developer and the location of the project.” A person in charge of a Longfor Beijing project said, “The Beijing market is still hot during the ‘May 1st’ holiday, with an average of more than 100 groups of customers received every day, compared with 4 The monthly average daily visits increased by more than 40%, and the transaction volume during the period exceeded 150 million yuan.”
“After the year, the market will pick up and recover, and the perception is more obvious.” Vanke Hangzhou Marketing Director said, “Our projects in Yuhang District, Hangzhou were continuously launched in February and March, and the sales growth of improvement projects was more obvious. Since March, the improvement projects The winning rate of the two openings was below 20%, and they were sold out immediately after the opening.” In addition, the Shaoxing market has been selling well this year. During the “May 1st” period, the subscription conversion of Vanke’s two projects on sale in Shaoxing increased by 20% to 30%.
Liu Lijie believes that Chengdu, Xi’an, Hangzhou, Changsha, Hefei and other provincial capital cities have stronger market recovery, benefiting from better economic, industrial, and population fundamentals, relatively sufficient housing demand, and optimized housing policies. “What’s more meaningful is that in the first quarter, the volume and price of the second-hand housing market in cities in the northeastern region such as Harbin, Changchun, and Shenyang, capital cities in the central and western regions such as Taiyuan and Lanzhou, and most third- and fourth-tier cities all recovered to varying degrees. However, Compared with second-tier cities, non-hotspot cities and third- and fourth-tier cities have relatively weak restoration efforts.”
From the data point of view, the report of Shanghai E-House Real Estate Research Institute shows that from January to March this year, 19 of the 31 provinces had a positive year-on-year growth rate of commercial housing sales area, and 12 provinces had a negative growth rate. Among them, Tianjin has the highest growth rate at 85%; Anhui has the lowest growth rate at -23%. Among the 13 major economic provinces, Beijing, Hebei and Guangdong performed best, with year-on-year growth rates of 14%, 10% and 10% respectively. It is worth noting that Tianjin’s indicator was -32% last year, and the indicator has now turned positive. This shows that under the stimulus of the housing purchase policy, the market still has the power to recover.
In terms of sales prices, there is also generally room for decline. The report shows that from January to March 2023, 27 of the 31 provinces in the country have a positive year-on-year increase in the sales price of commercial housing, and 4 provinces have a negative increase. Among them, Sichuan has the highest increase of 13%, and Tibet has the lowest increase of -12%. Among the 13 major economic provinces, 12 provinces have returned to positive housing price growth, while Hubei has dropped slightly.
Yan Yuejin, research director of Shanghai E-House Real Estate Research Institute, said that the real estate data of 31 provinces across the country in the first quarter showed several important features: the supply-side recovery is slow, while the sales-side recovery is fast, and follow-up attention should be paid to the “expanding gap between supply and demand” Contradictory issues; in the process of market recovery, some northern provinces have risen significantly, including Tianjin, Hebei and other key northern markets may also pick up, market confidence has further strengthened, and the balance of the national real estate market has also been further enhanced.
“The market recovery in the first quarter was partly due to the concentrated release of the backlog of demand in the previous period. With the gradual release of this wave of demand, the market will naturally adjust in the short term. It is expected that the transaction volume in the second quarter will drop compared with the first quarter, and the price will remain stable.” Liu Lijie said, “This is also a normal shock in the process of the market recovering to a reasonable center. It is expected that the market as a whole will show a moderate recovery trend throughout the year.”
The current property market returns to normal
Since the second quarter, housing prices in hundreds of cities have been under pressure, prices in core first- and second-tier cities are relatively stable, and housing prices in many third- and fourth-tier cities have continued to decline. Most people in the industry still believe that the general trend of property market recovery will not change, and market confidence is generally in a state of recovery.
“Compared to the rapid rebound in February and March, the pace of recovery in the property market slowed down in April, further verifying that this year’s market recovery will show a pattern of ups and downs. In April, the enthusiasm for finding houses in some cities fell slightly month-on-month. Among them, third- and fourth-tier cities The decline in the popularity of house hunting is relatively obvious, and it is expected that the market differentiation pattern will still exist.” Zhang Bo, president of 58 Anjuke Research Institute, said that the number of newly listed houses in first- and second-tier hot cities in April decreased month-on-month, which reflects to a certain extent In the first quarter, the transaction volume of second-hand housing in the market increased significantly, and a large number of second-hand housing sources were sold.
Industry insiders believe that the property market has returned to normal since April, due to both long-term and short-term factors. In the long run, the faster market pace in the first quarter led to higher price expectations, but the current payment ability and acceptance of the market remain stable. Therefore, a wait-and-see attitude towards the increased market price is still the main one, which leads to a slowdown in the pace . In the short term, before the “May 1st” holiday, many people plan their trips early, which will inevitably squeeze real estate sales. In addition, there are weather effects. Taking Beijing as an example, several strong sand and dust weathers were experienced in April, which had a certain impact on customers’ inspections.
“By April and May, Beijing’s property market has turned into a normalized period. Since April, home buyers have become more wait-and-see in their mentality. According to our analysis, among the current home buyers, 70% belong to the replacement group, including improvement replacement, Enrollment replacement, pension replacement, etc.” Leng Hui said.
Mr. An, who works in Beijing, belongs to the wait-and-see group of currency holders. He told reporters that the decoration of his house in Century City is a little old. Last year, he wanted to “sell one and buy one” to replace it with a bigger house, but it was put on hold due to the impact of the epidemic. “I changed my mind this year. My child has already entered high school. For future consideration, I should buy a small house for the child. The old house will not be sold.” Mr. An believes that housing prices, especially new house prices, may decline. His willingness to buy a house There is no rush, you can wait and see.
“My child is going to school this year, and these two days are the registration period.” Ms. Ma, who also needs to change houses, plans, “I will sell the old house after the registration is successful and buy a more comfortable house.”
Many people believe that compared with February and March, April and May actually returned to a normal and stable rhythm. Both buyers and sellers have more time to calm down and make choices, and there is also room for competition in prices.
Ms. Gao, a native of Beijing, pays more attention to living experience because her parents own a house. “I think that the first thing about a house is to live comfortably, and secondly, the surrounding facilities should be good, and the living circle should be convenient. I don’t pay much attention to factors such as location and appreciation space.”
The latest data from the National Bureau of Statistics shows that in terms of new houses, in April, the sales price of new commercial housing in first-tier cities rose by 0.4% month-on-month, and the increase was slightly expanded by 0.1 percentage points from the previous month. Among them, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen rose by 0.6% month-on-month , 0.4%, 0.2% and 0.3%; the sales prices of new commercial housing in second- and third-tier cities rose by 0.4% and 0.2% month-on-month, respectively, and the growth rate dropped by 0.2 and 0.1 percentage points respectively from the previous month. From the perspective of second-hand housing, the overall increase in the chain has dropped more obviously. In April, the sales price of second-hand housing in first-tier cities rose by 0.2% month-on-month, and the growth rate dropped by 0.3 percentage points from the previous month. Among them, Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen rose by 0.1%, 0.3% and 0.5% month-on-month respectively, and Shanghai rose by 0.7% from the previous month. It was a decrease of 0.2%; the sales prices of second-hand housing in second- and third-tier cities all changed from an increase in the previous month to a flat month-on-month period.
From the perspective of cities, the Shanghai E-House Real Estate Research Institute ranked the growth rate of newly-built commercial housing transactions in 50 key cities across the country in April, showing that there were only 6 cities in the country where the transaction prices did not decline, namely Xi’an, Beijing, Dongying, Chengdu, Hefei and Shenzhen. “The strong cities in April are generally large cities with good fundamentals. From the perspective of cities that have declined, Xuzhou, Lishui, and Nanning have seen their speed decrease by more than 50%, and the market adjustment is relatively large.” Yan Yuejin interpreted it this way.
From January to April, the ranking results of the year-on-year growth rate of new housing transaction area in 50 cities across the country show that Changchun, Hangzhou, Nanning, Huizhou, Zibo, Jinan, Deyang, Zhaoqing, Dongying and Dongguan ranked in the top ten, with year-on-year growth rates close to or More than 50%. Yan Yuejin said, “In such cities, some of them belong to the cities with obvious loose housing policies, and some belong to the cities where the suppressed demand continues to be released.”
It is worth noting that among the top 10 cities, three cities in Shandong are shortlisted, namely Zibo, Jinan and Dongying. This is not accidental. During the three-year epidemic period, coastal provinces such as Jiangsu and Zhejiang had a wave of transaction peaks, but Shandong was not obvious, and the potential demand for housing purchases was only released this year. A wave of continuous market in Jinan market has led to the recovery of the property market in surrounding prefecture-level cities.
“Although the popularity of ‘Zibo BBQ’ is not directly related to the recovery of Shandong’s property market, it has improved the image of the city and the advantages of property ownership, which may have an indirect positive impact on the subsequent recovery of the property market in Shandong cities.” Yan Yuejin said.
Policies applied according to the city are superimposed and effective
Throughout the whole of last year, under the influence of multiple unexpected factors, the transaction data showed an obvious inflection point. “In 2022, the real estate market will show the characteristics of a decline in market sales, debt defaults of many private enterprises, and continuous failure of bids in the land market.” said Zhang Dawei, chief analyst of Centaline Real Estate.
In the face of market shocks, a series of property market regulation policies have been introduced one after another to promote the recovery of the real estate market. Since March last year, property market regulation policies have been issued intensively, and various localities have implemented policies according to cities, from optimizing purchase restriction policies, reducing down payment ratios and mortgage interest rates, increasing the amount of provident fund loans, issuing housing subsidies, reducing transaction taxes and fees, and promoting “transfer with mortgage” etc. Aspects of effort. According to the monitoring of the Middle Finger Research Institute, more than 300 provinces, cities (counties) will issue more than a thousand policies in 2022, and the frequency of policy optimization will reach the peak in recent years.
In March 2022, Zhengzhou became the first city to cancel the “recognition of housing and subscription of loans”. Banking financial institutions implement the first-home loan policy.” Since then, key cities such as Suzhou, Nanjing, Qingdao, and Tianjin have all optimized the “recognition of housing and subscription of loans”. “Zhengzhou’s move to cancel the recognition of houses and loans has demonstration significance for other key cities in China. It has substantially reduced the cost of house purchases, released and improved the demand for house replacement, and promoted market recovery.” Liu Lijie said.
In May 2022, Changsha became the first city to propose “rent-for-purchase”. The stock housing will be revitalized for rental housing. After revitalizing the rental housing, it will not be included in the calculation of the number of family housing units, and it can be traded during the performance period. Since then, Chengdu, Chongqing, Xi’an and other places have also introduced “rent-for-purchase” policies.
“The innovation of the ‘rent-for-purchase’ policy is that it has opened up new housing, second-hand housing and rental housing markets, and provided new policy adjustment samples for other cities.” Liu Lijie said that the inventory of housing as rental housing has actually increased. The supply of rental housing; on the other hand, the lock-up period of 10 years or more has provided the market with a batch of long-term stable rental housing, effectively alleviating the pain point of the current “unstable” rental market.
Since last year, the surrounding cities of Foshan, Dongguan, Langfang and other core cities have completely canceled purchase restrictions. Second-tier cities such as Hangzhou, Nanjing, and Wuhan have relaxed their home purchase policies for families with multiple children. Families with multiple children can purchase a new house while reducing the down payment ratio for a second house.
Since the beginning of this year, my country’s economy has shown a recovery trend, and the stability of the real estate market is particularly important. “Stabilizing pillars”, “promoting demand” and “preventing risks” have become the policy themes of the real estate industry in 2023. In the first quarter, the central government and relevant regulatory authorities repeatedly emphasized the need to adhere to the positioning that houses are for living in, not for speculation, and implement policies according to cities to support rigid and improved housing needs. According to the monitoring of China Finger Research Institute, in the first quarter, more than 100 provinces and cities (counties) across the country issued more than 180 policies. Most of the local policies focused on increasing the amount of provident fund loans and issuing housing subsidies. Some urban policies involved optimizing purchase restriction policies and reducing down payments. Ratio and mortgage interest rate, optimization of pre-sale capital supervision and other aspects.
On April 28, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee held a meeting to analyze and study the current economic situation and economic work. “Combining the relevant signals released by the meeting, preventing real estate risks is still the key point. Under the current market environment, the real estate policy environment is still in a loose state.” Chen Wenjing, director of market research at the Middle Finger Research Institute, said, “On the whole, the real estate market has been relatively stable since the beginning of this year. The improvement in operation is more of a recovery improvement, and the endogenous driving force of the market is still weak. In the short term, stabilizing the confidence and expectations of home buyers is still the key to promoting the recovery of the real estate market.”
Chen Wenjing believes that in the second quarter, policies such as guaranteeing the delivery of buildings and increasing the “three arrows” to support the financing of real estate companies that have been introduced in the early stage are expected to continue to be implemented. The property market policies in various places may continue to be optimized, such as the suburbs with high inventory in key first- and second-tier cities, or in accordance with the principle of one district, one policy, to optimize the purchase restriction conditions and the housing and mortgage policy; combined with the birth policy, the number of units purchased and the down payment for families with two children or more ratio, mortgage interest rates, etc.; reduce housing transaction taxes and fees.
“With economic recovery and urban development, core first- and second-tier cities will continue to give play to their fundamental advantages in terms of economy, population, and industry, and the real estate market has a lot of room for development. With weak economic development and population outflows from cities, the market is expected to basically recover until the epidemic The previous stable state.” Liu Lijie said.