One in five China homes empty in 2013: Report

More than one in five homes in China’s urban areas was vacant in 2013, according to a new study, China Daily reported, citing local media. About 22.4% of all homes in urban areas, or 48.98 million units, were unused last year, China Business News said on Wednesday using data from a report produced by the Research Center for China Household Finance Survey under Southwestern University of Finance and Economics. The vacancy rate was 1.8 percentage points higher than in 2011, the study said. Such reports remain controversial given the difficulty in assessing how many homes are actually vacant.