中國房地產：分析師表示，在買家信心低迷的情況下，「平淡」的刺激措施無法實現市場的復甦 (2/2)

Recently Yahoo News on-line reported the following:

China property: 'underwhelming' stimulus to fall short of refloating market amid sunken buyer confidence, analysts say (2/2)

South China Morning Post

Sat, May 25, 2024 at 2:30 a.m. PDT·9 min read

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It will not be easy, according to economists, analysts and industry players, who cite broader economic expectations, fundamental demographic changes and the changing consumption behaviour of prospective buyers.

"The stimulus policies are encouraging for stabilizing the market, but it is not enough to change the expectations of homebuyers," said Zhu Ning, a professor of finance at the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance at Shanghai Jiao Tong University and author of China's Guaranteed Bubble.

"Unless there is speculative demand driven by strong expectations that prices will rise, buyers, except those buying for their own use, will not buy at this level of prices, which are still high if compared with their income."

Despite more than 70 measures to ease property distress over the first four months of 2024, home transactions have continued to slide. Sales by the top 100 developers in that period dropped 44.9 per cent year on year to 312.2 billion yuan, according to data from China Real Estate Information Corporation.

Prices of existing homes in March were down 23.9 per cent from a high in July 2021, according to data compiled by the Beike Research Institute based on a sample of 50 large cities.

"The myth that home prices will only rise has been broken over the past three years," said Zhu, who as early as 2016 called the property market a "bubble".

Back then, developers including China Evergrande Group and Country Garden Holdings were in a building frenzy driven by a nationwide "shantytown" redevelopment policy that aimed to raze and replace subpar housing across China. The policy offered subsidies for homeowners in lower-tier cities to buy new homes, and helped push prices to record highs, benefiting both homeowners and speculative investors.

Now, few expect quick improvement. "It will be a long time before we see home prices rise to levels as high as in 2017 and 2018, unless there is dramatic inflation or quantitative easing," Zhu said.

"The United States took six to seven years to get out of the woods of an economic recession brought about by a property crisis, while Japan took 20 years. And we are somewhere in between."

The craze for homebuying has passed, replaced by households selling their homes in favour of renting, cutting their mortgage exposure amid the risk of decreased income in the slow economy.

Meanwhile, household savings have surged, growing by 16.67 trillion yuan or nearly 14 per cent in 2023, compared with 2022, according to the People's Bank of China.

Linda Chen, a former teacher, now marketer, sold her 753 sq ft home in the eastern metropolis of Hangzhou at a discount of about 300,000 yuan in December, moving into a rented unit of similar size with her husband.

For years she had paid about 9,000 yuan a month for her mortgage, and was still paying 7,000 despite several rounds of mortgage rate cuts by the authorities last year. "The house had become a huge burden for us, and we knew we must sell no matter what the price was," Chen said.

"The [government's] countercyclical measures are not effective any more," said Raymond Yeung, chief economist at ANZ Research, adding that the link between rate cuts and rising property sales has been severed since 2022.

"The shock from the pandemic, diminishing economic optimism and the lack of confidence in real estate as a store of wealth have affected the prospects of property investment."

Declines in marriage registrations, the birth rate and rural-urban migration represent major structural headwinds for demand, and are unlikely to reverse in at least the next five to 10 years, analysts from BNP Paribas warned in a May 21 report.

"We believe the current demand-supply dynamics make it very difficult to see a substantial rebound in home purchases to a level that would help to quickly digest market inventories," they said.

"Personal experience has a great impact on one's risk appetite and investment decisions," Zhu said, adding that the past few years have taught young Chinese two lessons. First, young couples saw the risks of home delivery as they got nothing even after emptying "six wallets" - their own plus those of their parents. Second, they learned that even those lucky enough to get their homes could find themselves out of work and unable to afford loans.

"They once regretted not buying a home earlier when they saw their friends earning [from appreciation]," he said. "But now they are like, 'Thank God I didn't buy'."

Translation

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經濟學家、分析師和業內人士表示，這並不容易，他們引用了更廣泛的經濟預期、基本的人口變化, 以及潛在買家不斷變化的消費行為。

上海交通大學上海高級金融學院金融學教授、《中國保證會出现的泡沫》一書作者 Zhu Ning 表示： “刺激政策對於穩定市場是令人鼓舞的，但不足以改變購房者的預期” 。

“除非對價格上漲的強烈預期推動了投機需求，否則買家，除了自用的買家，不會以這樣的價格水平購買，與他們的收入相比，這個價格仍然很高。”

儘管 2024 年最前四個月出台了 70 多項緩解房地產困境的措施，但房屋交易仍持續下滑。中國房地產資訊集團 的數據顯示，同期一百大開發商銷售額年減44.9%至3,122億元。

根據 Beike 研究院基於50個大城市樣本編製的數據顯示，3月份成屋價格較2021年7月的高點下降了23.9%。

Zhu說: 「房價只會上漲的迷思在過去三年已經被打破」，他早在2016年就稱房地產市場為「泡沫」。

當時，中國恆大集團和碧桂園控股等開發商在全國範圍內的「棚戶區」改造政策的推動下掀起了一場建設熱潮，該政策旨在拆除和更換中國各地的劣質住房。該政策為低線城市的房主購買新房子提供補貼，並幫助推動房價創下歷史新高，使房主和投機投資者都受益。

現在，很少有人予期有快速改善。Zhu 說： “除非出現劇烈的通膨或量化寬鬆，否則我們需要很長時間才能看到房價升至2017年和2018年的水平。”

“美國花了六到七年的時間才擺脫了房地產危機帶來的經濟衰退的困境，而日本則花了20年的時間。而我們則介於兩者之間。”

購屋熱潮已經過去，取代的是家庭出售房屋以租房代之，在經濟低迷帶來收入下降的風險下, 減少了抵押貸款風險。

同時，中國人民銀行的數據顯示，2023年居民儲蓄大幅增加16.67兆元，較2022年成長近14%。

Linda Chen 曾是一名教師，現在是營銷人員，去年12月，她以約30萬元的折扣賣掉了自己在東部大都市杭州的753平方英尺的房子，並與丈夫搬進了一套類似面積的出租單位。

多年來，她每月支付約9,000元的抵押貸款，儘管去年當局多次下調抵押貸款利率，但她仍在支付7,000元。Chen 說: 「房子對我們來說已經成為一個巨大的負擔，我們知道無論價格多少我們都必須賣掉」。

澳新銀行研究部首席經濟學家 Raymond Yeung 表示：「（政府）反週期措施不再有效」, 他補充說，自 2022 年以來，降息與房地產銷售成長之間的關係已被切斷。

“疫情帶來的衝擊、經濟樂觀情緒的減弱, 以及人們對房地產作為財富儲存手段缺乏信心，影響了房地產投資的前景。”

法國巴黎銀行分析師在5 月21 日的一份報告中警告說，婚姻登記、出生率和農村人口向城市遷移的下降是需求的主要結構性阻力，並且至少在未來5 到10 年內不太可能逆轉。

他們表示： “我們認為，當前的供需動態, 很難使購房量大幅反彈至一水平有助於快速消化市場庫存。”

Zhu 說：「個人經驗對一個人的風險偏好和投資決策有很大影響」。他又補充說，過去幾年給中國年輕人兩個教訓。首先，年輕夫婦看到了送貨上門的風險，因為他們掏空了自己加上父母的「六個錢包」後卻一無所獲。其次，他們了解到，即使是那些足夠幸運獲得住房的人也可能會發現自己失業並且無力償還貸款。

他說: 「當他們看到朋友（從升值中）賺到錢時，他們曾經後悔沒有早點買房」; 「但現在他們會感到， “謝天謝地我沒有買” 」。

              So, some experts expect that the government's countercyclical measures are not effective any more. The shock from the pandemic, diminishing economic optimism and the lack of confidence in real estate as a store of wealth have affected the prospects of property investment. Furthermore, declines in marriage registrations, birth rate and rural-urban migration represent major structural headwinds for demand. They believe the current demand-supply dynamics make it very difficult to see a substantial rebound in home purchases.

Note:

1. China's Guaranteed Bubble《中國保證會出现的泡沫》 is a book written by Ning Zhu in 2016. According to Google Books, the book suggests that in recent years, the Chinese economy has been fueled by the implicit guarantee to both major banks and local governments by the nation’s central government. The resultant bubble has led to the emergence of a large shadow banking industry that poses major risks to China’s real estate market, speculative stock investments, state-owned enterprises, and more. This book, written by renowned financial scholar Ning Zhu, provides a provocative in-depth analysis of China’s current economic practices—and the profound dangers they pose—as well as a powerful wake-up call to investors, regulators, and the entire financial industry. (https://books.google.ca/books/about/China_s_Guaranteed_Bubble.html?id)