BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s capital Beijing will increase the proportion of land supply for rental properties to 30% this year from 13% in 2020, official media reported, in a bid to improve housing affordability as the city’s home prices remain sky-rocketed.
The move follows call from China’s top leaders who vowed to focus on the development of rental housing markets to help solve a housing problem in big cities.
It also comes as a wave of frenzied home buying in China’s bigger cities that has pushed up prices, prompting local authorities to take steps to rein in the market.
The city will also speed up rental housing supply by renovating existing buildings to make them suitable for rental homes to help stabilise home prices and market expectations, the Beijing Daily reported on Tuesday, citing the local government land supply plan.
The total land supply for residential housing in 2021 will increase by 60 hectares from last year, it said.
The government will also guide new plots of residential use of land to locate near railway stations.
(Reporting by Lusha Zhang and Ryan Woo, editing by Louise Heavens)
