A policy which is designed to limit
foreigners and people from Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan from buying
homes on the mainland will be published in the near future. It's
designed to curb speculation in the over-heated property market,
China Business News reported Thursday.
Non-citizens have first to get approval to buy mainland properties
and then they must register the purchase, the news report
said.
The policy goes as far as to stipulate that they can buy only one
or two residential properties and the units can't be resold in a
certain period of time after purchase, the news report
stated.
The policy is an administrative regulation which "will be effective
almost instantaneously and keep pace with financial or taxation
changes," an official told the newspaper yesterday.
China eliminated the different systems between local and non-local
purchase of real estate in 2002. This made China one of the few
countries within the 187 member International Monetary Fund who
posed no limits on investments in real estate.
Overseas institutional investors have purchased a large number of
property projects in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou this year and
this has contributed to soaring house prices, previous news reports
have stated.
In 2005 alone, foreign investors bought properties in China worth
at least US$3.4 billion, with US$5.4 billion being co-invested in
housing projects.
(China Business News July 7, 2006)