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The trend of relaxing the "housing purchase and settlement" policy has begun to spread to first-tier cities.

Recently, Huadu District of Guangzhou City announced that buyers of houses can enjoy "quasi-hukou" treatment, taking the lead in firing the first shot of "buying a house and settling down" in first-tier cities.

Guangzhou implements policies based on districts, Huadu offers “quasi-hukou” treatment for home buyers

On August 6, the Housing and Urban-Rural Development Bureau of Huadu District, Guangzhou City, issued a notice on "Several Measures to Further Promote the Stable and Healthy Development of the Real Estate Market", which mentioned that home buyers can enjoy Huadu's "quasi-hukou" treatment, that is, non-local residents who purchase newly built commercial housing within the administrative area of ​​Huadu District can receive a Huadu Talent Green Card, and enjoy the district's policy-based preferential admission benefits with the Huadu Talent Green Card and a home purchase contract.

Chen Xueqiang, research director of China Index Academy South China Branch, pointed out that the policy issued by Huadu District to enjoy "quasi-hukou" treatment for home purchases has taken the lead in firing the first shot of "home purchase and settlement" in first-tier cities, and also reflects the concept of formulating policies based on the district.

The new Huadu policy of "quasi-hukou" treatment is particularly focused on public school places. According to the regulations, children of cardholders who meet the age requirements in the preschool education stage are eligible to register for computer allocation of kindergartens run by the education department in the district where they live in accordance with the relevant regulations of the education department on preschool education; in the compulsory education stage, they are arranged by the education department and are eligible to enter the starting grade of compulsory education in public schools (including places purchased by the government in private schools).

Chen Xueqiang believes that the new policy will help boost the enthusiasm of non-local residents to buy houses, especially for families who need to solve the problem of public schooling for their children, which will further release their demand for housing. It will be beneficial to the new housing market in the region to a certain extent, and other peripheral regions with large inventories may introduce similar policies in the future.

Monitoring data from China Index Academy shows that by the end of July 2024, the inventory of newly built commercial housing in Huadu District reached 1.492 million square meters, ranking third in the city, with a sales cycle of 24.2 months. Huadu District ranks among the top in the city in terms of both inventory and sales cycle, and the overall sales pressure is relatively high.

Since the beginning of this year, more than 10 cities have made it possible to settle down by purchasing a house

It can be seen that in addition to enjoying "quasi-hukou" treatment when purchasing a house, since this year, many popular cities have attracted new citizens by settling in through purchasing a house, optimizing the points-based settlement policy, exploring settlement through renting a house, and settling in through employment.

In the industry's view, policies such as purchasing a house and settling down combine housing policy with population policy, which can not only increase the population absorption capacity, but also help promote the further release of local housing demand.

According to statistics from the China Index Academy, more than 10 cities have introduced policies to allow people to settle down by purchasing a house or to apply for settlement since the beginning of this year, such as Wuhan, Hangzhou, Suzhou, Shenyang, Foshan, Nanjing and other cities.

For example, Hangzhou currently adopts a points system for settling in, and you can settle in Hangzhou if you have 100 points. On May 9 this year, Hangzhou issued the "Notice on Optimizing and Adjusting the Real Estate Market Regulation Policy", which clearly stated that the points-based settlement policy would be optimized, and non-local residents who have obtained legal property rights in the city can apply for settlement. After the policy adjustment, the points for buying a house in Hangzhou increased from 30 points to 80 points, greatly increasing the weight of the points for buying a house.

In addition, on May 11, the Nanjing Municipal Public Security Bureau issued a "Notice on Matters Concerning Settlement with Legal and Stable Residence", which mentioned that the settlement conditions will be further relaxed, and non-Nanjing residents who have legal and stable residence and actually live in the city can directly apply for settlement.

Foshan’s new policy also shows that the policy on household registration by purchasing a house will be relaxed. Non-local residents who own a residential property in Foshan with legal property rights can apply for household registration in the location of the property, and their spouse and minor children who live together can move with them.

China Index Academy believes that the current settlement conditions in most cities are relatively relaxed. The State Council has recently reiterated the cancellation and relaxation of settlement policies in cities of different levels in the household registration system reform tasks of the "Five-Year Action Plan for Deeply Implementing a People-Oriented New Urbanization Strategy". It is expected that subsequent settlement policies for purchasing a house may be promoted in more cities.

Li Yujia, chief researcher at the Guangdong Housing Policy Research Center, mentioned that buying a house to settle down will be a common phenomenon in the future, and even renting a house or having a stable residence can also settle down. However, the key depends on the value of the hukou, such as whether there is a high-quality school degree, the market's expectations for housing prices in the area, and whether there are large-scale physical enterprises in the area that can provide large-scale jobs.

"Buying a house and settling down" is conducive to further stimulating the vitality of the new housing market

"The policy of settling down by buying a house is ultimately part of the policy to stimulate the real estate market," said Lu Qilin, research director of 58 Anjuke Research Institute.

Lu Qilin mentioned that the transaction area of ​​new homes in Nanjing in the first half of 2024 was 1.37 million square meters, a year-on-year decrease of 58%. Hangzhou also showed a similar trend, with new home transactions in the first half of 2024 at 1.78 million square meters, a year-on-year decrease of 42%. Under the conditions of lifting purchase restrictions, lowering down payments, and lowering settlement standards, "buying a house to settle down" or optimizing the points-based settlement policy can further stimulate housing demand into the market.

He mentioned that judging from the favorable policies of the past two years, the policy effects can generally last for about one or two months. Therefore, buying a house and settling down in the short term will definitely benefit the entry of some housing demand into the market.

Lu Qilin said that in the long run, the attraction of a city to the population depends not only on the city's relatively complete supporting facilities, but also on whether the city has sufficient employment opportunities. Relatively speaking, the policy of settling in by purchasing a house needs to be more effective in first-tier and new first-tier cities.

Yan Yuejin, deputy director of the Shanghai E-House Real Estate Research Institute, mentioned that the housing and household registration linkage policy is in line with the guidance of the recently released "Five-Year Action Plan for Deeply Implementing the People-Oriented New Urbanization Strategy". At present, all parts of the country are implementing the home purchase and settlement policy, some of which are bold and some may be a little subtle, but the overall suggestion is to base on the guidance of the free flow of population and resource factors, and based on the new rules of "people, real estate and money", make the maximum relaxation in household registration policies, especially first-tier cities also need breakthrough policy content.