[photopress:propafford_1.jpg,full,alignright]The Beijing Times reports that, according to the price department of the National Development and Reform Commission, average prices of economically affordable houses in 36 large and medium-sized cities fell by 1.2% from a month earlier in August. That is the first monthly drop this year but it will need a lot more to bring them back to affordable levels.
To which end, as rising food and house prices exert strong inflation pressures this year, the State Council is issuing affordable housing guidelines for low-income families.
According to the State Council the government will buy back economically affordable houses from owners who buy a second house, and newly-built affordable houses are required to be about 60 square meters each,
According to statistics from the Ministry of Construction by the end of last year, the State had completed construction of 1.3 billion square meters of economically affordable houses.
The proportion of commodity housing units with a floor space of less than 90 square meters each among the total permitted for presale rose to 39.26% between January and July from 34.39% last year.
So there is the smallest of dips in the price of economically affordable apartments possibly because of increasing supply.
By contrast, average commercial house prices in first, second, and third class land sectors in 36 cities rose 0.7%, 1.7%, and 0.6% respectively month-on-month.
Source: China Daily