TY  - JOUR
AU  - Wu,Jing
AU  - Gyourko,Joseph
AU  - Deng,Yongheng
TI  - Evaluating Conditions in Major Chinese Housing Markets
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 16189
PY  - 2010
Y2  - July 2010
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16189
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16189.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Jing Wu
National University of Singapore
and Tsinghua University
E-Mail: irswj@nus.edu.sg

Joseph Gyourko
University of Pennsylvania
Wharton School of Business
3620 Locust Walk
1480 Steinberg-Dietrich Hall
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6302
Tel: 215/898-3003
Fax: 215/573-2220
E-Mail: gyourko@wharton.upenn.edu

Yongheng Deng
Institute of Real Estate Studies
National University of Singapore
Singapore
E-Mail:  ydeng@nus.edu.sg
AB  - High and rising prices in Chinese housing markets have attracted global attention, as well as the interest of the Chinese government and its regulators.  Housing markets look very risky based on the stylized facts we document.  Price-to-rent ratios in Beijing and seven other large markets across the country have increased from 30% to 70% since the beginning of 2007.  Current price-to-rent ratios imply very low user costs of no more than 2%-3% of house value.  Very high expected capital gains appear necessary to justify such low user costs of owning.  Our calculations suggest that even modest declines in expected appreciation would lead to large price declines of over 40% in markets such as Beijing, absent offsetting rent increases or other countervailing factors.  Price-to-income ratios also are at their highest levels ever in Beijing and select other markets.  Much of the increase in prices is occurring in land values.  Using data from the local land auction market in Beijing, we are able to produce a constant quality land price index for that city.  Real, constant quality land values have increased by nearly 800% since the first quarter of 2003, with half that rise occurring over the past two years.  State-owned enterprises controlled by the central government have played an important role in this increase, as our analysis shows they paid 27% more than other bidders for an otherwise equivalent land parcel.
ER  -