China’s ‘Perfect Plan’ to Revive Home Market Draws Skeptics
- Cities offering vouchers for shantytown residents to buy homes
- Measure worked during previous slump but repeat seen unlikely
This article is for subscribers only.
Chinese local governments are increasingly turning to a tool used in the last housing downturn to revive the market. Analysts say it’s unlikely to work.
Authorities in at least 20 small cities have been allowing households that agree to have their run-down properties demolished to choose so-called “housing vouchers” as compensation, according to a Bloomberg tally of local policies. The vouchers can be used to buy new homes in the private market, and some cities provide cash subsidies as additional incentives.