The real estate industry chain is long and has a wide range of coverage, which is related to the vital interests of the people. Since the beginning of this year, various places have actively adjusted and optimized real estate policies, from lowering the threshold for buying houses to reducing the tax and fee burden of changing housing, from introducing "good houses" standards to purchasing existing commercial housing, taking multiple measures to improve the accuracy and effectiveness of the policies, and promoting the real estate market to stop falling and stabilize.

  What new changes are present in the current real estate market? Is the supply and demand relationship more reasonable? What is the future development space for the real estate market? The reporter recently visited many places for investigation, interviewed local real estate authorities, industry associations, real estate companies and research institutions, and had an in-depth understanding of market trends.

  Multi-dimensional signal of market stability

  On April 12, the opening sales site of the Hengyi Hongshan Huafu project in Longhua District, Shenzhen was crowded with people, and home buyers lined up to enter the market, and it was sold out after 90 minutes of opening.

  Ms. Zhou, who bought a 66-square-meter two-bedroom apartment, told reporters that thanks to the policy benefits of lowering the down payment ratio of second houses in Shenzhen from 70% to 20% and lowering mortgage interest rates, she purchased a second house at a lower cost. "The real estate market is relatively stable now, and I think the time to buy a house is good now," said Ms. Zhou.

  The new housing market is active, and second-hand housing transactions have increased significantly. During the "Golden Three Silver and Four" season of the traditional real estate market, the real estate market in first-tier cities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen continued to stabilize.

  On the evening of April 13, the reporter saw at the Beijing Lianjia Dahongmen Signing Service Center that 11 signing rooms were filled with customers coming to negotiate. Since March, this contracted service center has sold about 35 orders on weekends. A broker who came to the contract service center to handle business told reporters that his store currently mainly needs a transaction price of about 2 million yuan, and the transaction pace is faster than before.

  Data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed that in the first quarter, first-tier cities performed well overall, with the sales area of ​​newly built commercial housing increasing by 0.6%. Data from the Shenzhen Municipal Housing and Urban-Rural Development Bureau shows that from January 1 to April 16, the number of online sales of newly built commercial residential buildings in Shenzhen increased by 75.1% year-on-year; the number of online sales of second-hand residential buildings increased by 55.0% year-on-year. According to data from the Beijing Municipal Housing and Urban-Rural Development Commission, in March, the number of online signings for new houses in Beijing increased by 125.6% month-on-month, and the number of online signings for second-hand houses increased by 61.4% month-on-month. Second-hand housing transactions in Shanghai and Guangzhou also showed an upward trend. As of April 21, the number of second-hand housing online signings in Shanghai exceeded 16,000 units.

  The markets in some second-tier cities continue to recover. The reporter conducted research in Chengdu, Nanjing, Hangzhou and other places and found that the local real estate market showed stable market demand. Many people with actual living needs actively entered the market after a period of waiting and watching, and the activity of the real estate market transactions increased. Whether it is the new house or the second-hand house market, the transaction cycle has been significantly shortened.

  Li Yujia, chief researcher at the Guangdong Provincial Housing Policy Research Center, said that since the beginning of this year, various places have actively optimized real estate-related policies. For example, many places have increased the maximum amount of provident fund loans, reduced the down payment ratio of provident fund loans, launched special financial products, and increased policy support for housing purchase subsidies and housing "old for new". With the support of policies, rigid and improved housing demand is constantly stimulated and released.

  House prices are an important signal for restoring market confidence. Data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed that in March, among the 70 large and medium-sized cities, 24 cities had month-on-month increase in sales prices of newly built commercial housing, 6 more than the previous month; 10 cities had month-on-month increase in sales prices of second-hand housing, 7 more than the previous month. The sales prices of commercial housing in first-tier cities rose month-on-month, while the overall decline in sales prices in second- and third-tier cities narrowed.

  As a leading indicator for observing the trend of the real estate market, the land market in some cities is active. In March, Chengdu refreshed the ceiling of residential land floor price twice in half a month; in the first quarter, there were frequent land transaction prices in Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou and other places with a total land transaction price exceeding 5 billion yuan and a premium rate exceeding 100%. Data from CRIC Research Center shows that the national monthly land premium rate returns to more than 10% after 44 months.

  "The current positive signals in the real estate market are multi-dimensional, indicating that the trend of stopping the decline and stabilizing has been further consolidated." Li Yujia said that this is not only due to the continuous release of policy dividends, but also reflects the gradual recovery of market confidence.

  Multiple measures to promote more balanced supply and demand

  Overall, the current real estate market is still in the adjustment stage, with obvious differentiation between different cities and internal sectors, and key cities and core areas continue to recover, but the sales rate of third- and fourth-tier cities and cities in the suburbs and peripheral areas is relatively slow.

  "The focus of the real estate package policy 'combination punch' is to continuously improve the problems of imbalance, unbalanced and inadequate real estate development." said Yu Xiaofen, dean of the China Housing and Real Estate Research Institute of Zhejiang University of Technology.

  For a long time, a major pain point facing the real estate market is that on the one hand, the scale of existing commercial housing in some places is large and slow to digest; on the other hand, the housing needs of new citizens and young people need to be solved urgently. In response to this structural shortage of supply and demand, the national policy level has clearly stated that in cities with a large inventory of commercial housing, the government can order on demand and purchase existing commercial housing as affordable housing.

  In Zhengzhou, Henan, Wang Xiaodong, who rented a Songshan Meiyu Talent Apartment in Erqi District, told reporters that although the one-bedroom apartment he lives in is only 40 square meters, the interior furniture and appliances are complete, and the public areas are equipped with gym, table tennis room, yoga room and other facilities, making it comfortable to live and cost-effective.

  According to a relevant person in charge of Zhengzhou Chengfa Anju Co., Ltd., the existing housing was transformed into talent apartments through market-oriented acquisitions. The company has put into operation a total of 37 talent apartment projects in Zhengzhou, providing 56,000 units (rooms) of housing, and serving more than 60,000 young talents. According to the plan, this number will increase to 100,000 units by the end of 2026.

  To revitalize existing real estate resources and solve the housing difficulties of new citizens and young people, more than 10 cities have implemented commercial housing projects.

  On the land side, supply and demand adjustment is also developing towards "reducing quantity and improving quality". Yu Xiaofen said that most cities actively adjust their supply structure, compress the scale of land supply, focus on high-quality plots, launch a lot of "small and beautiful" land, and promote the intensive utilization of land resources. Taking Hangzhou as an example, among the 40 commercial residential land sold this year, 90% of the single land plot does not exceed 90,000 square meters. These lands are fully equipped and have a moderate floor area ratio, making them more suitable for the development of high-quality residential buildings.

  According to data from CRIC Research Center, in the first quarter of 2025, the total construction area of ​​pre-supplied land in the country decreased by 47% year-on-year, and the land area decreased by 38%. Third- and fourth-tier cities "actively clear out", and some cities suspended the supply of residential land at the beginning of the year.

  Reshaping the balance of supply and demand, the renovation of urban villages and dilapidated houses is an important part. This year, my country continues to step up efforts to implement the renovation of urban villages and dilapidated houses, promote monetary resettlement, and plans to continue to expand the scale of renovation on the basis of adding 1 million new urban villages and dilapidated houses.

  Ye Yumin, executive director of the China Urban Planning Society, said that with the widespread promotion of monetized resettlement methods represented by housing tickets and the "purchase instead of construction" resettlement housing financing methods, urban village renovation will drive the release of more housing demand and the digestion of commercial housing stock.

  Accelerate the construction of a new model of real estate development

  What is the future real estate development space in my country? Sheng Laiyun, deputy director of the National Bureau of Statistics, said that from the perspective of development space, China's consumption structure is generally still in the process of upgrading, urbanization has not been completed, the real estate market has huge room for growth, and residents have a large demand for green, spacious and comfortable "good houses".

  Urbanization and real estate development need to form a benign interaction. "The urbanization process continues to provide strong impetus for real estate development, and the healthy development of real estate in turn promotes the improvement of urban functions and quality improvement." He Xinyu, general manager of Ruihetai Industrial and Urban Development Research Institute, said that in urban development, with the continuous aggregation of population and the optimization and upgrading of industrial structure, real estate ushers in huge development space and opportunities.

  Taking the Linjiaba-Bailuwan Market area in Jinjiang District, Chengdu, Sichuan as an example, from December 7 to 8, 2021, 4 pieces of land were sold in the area, with a maximum premium rate of 3.9%, and two pieces of land were sold at the lowest price; as Jinjiang District released the area's industrial plan, industrial projects and high-quality education and medical supporting resources were introduced one after another. The land market in the area has been active in the past three years. The recent three land transaction premium rate exceeded 30%, and many high-quality hot-selling residential projects have appeared.

  Yu Xiaofen said that to build a new model of real estate development, it is necessary to establish a new mechanism for linking elements of "people, house, land and money" based on the new stage and new characteristics of urban development, starting from the scientific allocation of factor resources, determining houses based on people, determining land based on houses, and determining money based on houses, and preventing big ups and downs of the market.

  Satisfies people's yearning for a better living life is a natural consequence of future real estate development.

  Near the Life Science Park in Shahe Town, Changping District, Beijing, the first implementation demonstration project of the National "Good House" Design Competition, "Longhu Guancui", is under construction. Mr. Chen, who just purchased a 117-square-meter four-bedroom residence in the property, said: "The project not only designed a shared space of 1,000 square meters, but also has facilities such as gym, children's entertainment area, elderly leisure area, shared office, etc., and the interior adopts flexible and variable apartments, which perfectly meet the living needs of our second-child family."

  With the implementation of the new version of the "Residential Project Standards" on May 1 this year and the implementation of supporting policies in various places, housing quality improvement has entered the fast lane. The project specifications have higher requirements for floor height, elevator configuration, sound insulation performance, etc., providing standard support for the construction of a "good house".

  To build a new model of real estate development, the construction of "good houses" must coordinate the incremental and existing volume. Feng Bo, deputy director of Chengdu Urban Construction and Development Research Institute, said that in incremental construction, we must provide high-quality housing with better apartment types, more complete functions, more complete supporting facilities and better services through good design, good materials, good construction and good services; in terms of stock optimization, we must improve residential functions and supporting facilities through urban renewal and old city renovation, make up for the shortcomings of basic public service facilities, and achieve comprehensive improvement of good houses, good communities, good communities, and good urban areas. (Reporter Qi Zhongxi, Wang Youling, Li Qianwei)

[Editor in charge: Nie Jing]