Capital to be tightened in domestic property; crackdown on irregularities to continue

China’s plan to increase investment in the infrastructure sector later this year is unlikely to bring more capital into the domestic real estate market, as housing authorities will continue to stick with tightened industrial regulations, an expert said on Thursday.

During a Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China’s Central Committee meeting on July 31, the country said it will step up efforts to deepen supply-side structural reform, with more efforts to be made in improving infrastructure, the Xinhua News Agency reported.

The domestic market will be further reined in this year and increased investment in infrastructure may not bring capital to the sector in the short run, Yan Yuejin, a research director at the Shanghai-based E-house China R&D Institute, told the Global Times on Thursday.

Housing sales have been restricted in Chinese first- and second-tier cities, and more regulations are emerging in third- and four-tier cities, Yan noted, adding that efforts like deleveraging in the property sector will continue this year.

Seven governmental departments announced in June that they will crack down hard on property irregularities, involving speculative investors, illegal agencies and illegal developers, in 30 major cities.

A total of 11 cities had unveiled crackdown measures as of Thursday, including Foshan and Guangzhou in South China’s Guangdong Province, Kunming, capital of Southwest China’s Yunnan Province and Hangzhou, capital of East China’s Zhejiang Province, domestic news site www.ce.cn reported on Thursday.

For instance, the housing authority of Hangzhou on Wednesday announced efforts to crack down on speculative buying and the release of fake information, saying a special government move focusing on curbing local home irregularities will last from July to the end of this year, the report said.