China's "shanty-town" renovation plan...>

CHINA PRESS: China's "shanty-town" renovation plan could help reduce the current

property inventory of around 300 million square meters as the government makes

efforts in compensating farmers with "monetary tools" instead of building new

houses for them, China Business News reported late Sunday night. The financial

news provider cited a report by Mingsheng Securities saying that the Chinese

government has increasingly been offering farmers whose houses are targeted for

demolition money or existing homes rather than new houses in compensation. This

method is now being used in 60% of cases, up from 48.5% last year and 29.9% in

2015, in an effort to tamp down housing stocks, especially in lower-tier Chinese

cities where inventories are relatively high, the report said. The method of

offering cash or existing homes to displaced farmers is beneficial for speeding

up sales and reducing housing inventories, although it may not directly increase

new housing starts, Wang Tao, chief China analyst at UBS, was quoted as saying

in the report. (China Business News)