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text/li yihe, leju finance

more than three years ago, a group of law enforcement officers suddenly walked into a sales office in fangshan, beijing.

leading the team was the then deputy mayor of fangshan district.

the cause is not complicated.this project wrapped the space on the north side, which was supposed to be an outdoor equipment platform, into the interior in order to achieve the purpose of "stealing area" and to publicize the high house ratio.

the project quickly became the best-selling product in the local area.

the arrival of the deputy district chief dealt it a heavy blow.

after the law enforcement officers left, the project received a rectification notice. subsequently, the model room with a conspicuous warning line marking the free area was quickly demolished.

over the past three years, the real estate industry has undergone tremendous changes. the continued decline of the market and the changes in the supply and demand relationship have caused the industry to go into a state of involution.

lowering prices, improving product quality, smarter and greener spaces, and higher free areas (also known as “stolen areas” by developers) have become the weapons that real estate developers use to try to impress buyers in a sluggish market.

at the same time, with the rise of the construction of "fourth-generation housing", various regions have also introduced new building regulations at the policy level, relaxing restrictions on the area of ​​​​balconies, bay windows, and aerial greening spaces.

this gave real estate developers more room to maneuver when creating products. for a time, marketing words such as "zero public area" or even "negative public area" appeared on various online platforms, attracting a lot of attention.

the “zero public area” wave has arrived.this is undoubtedly a good thing for new home sales that are subject to the new regulations.

especially in today's sluggish real estate market, developers can use this to enhance the competitiveness of their products and quickly clear inventory, while homebuyers can buy houses with higher utilization rates at lower prices.

however, the products before the new regulations in various places and the second-hand housing market have fallen into another more long-lasting inventory reduction process.

stealing area: from balconies, bay windows, to equipment platforms and fire-resistant eaves

in order to attract customers and reduce inventory in a sluggish market, real estate developers have reached new heights in the process of rolling up products. take beijing's shunyi district, the "king of rolling up", for example. real estate developers in this area have come up with endless means to "steal area". beijing's local boss zhuzong group has become the leader.

in august this year, china construction group successively announced the floor plans of fanghuali and qingnian one. both projects are located in shunyi district, less than four kilometers apart.

the fanghuali project site is the 01-03-21 plot in the 1st block of shunyi new town, shunyi district, beijing, which was acquired by zhuzong group in february this year. the total price is 1.26 billion yuan, and the sales guide price is 46,000 yuan per square meter. the products are 89 square meters, 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, 99 square meters, 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, and 132 square meters, 4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

the youth one project land is the second-class residential land of r2 and the childcare land of a334 in the sy00-3101-0808 and sy00-3101-0809 plots in shunyi district 31, which were acquired by zhuzong group on march 15 this year. the total price is 620 million yuan, and the residential sales guide price is 45,000 yuan per square meter. the project products include 72 square meters, 3 bedrooms and 1 bathroom, 89 square meters, 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, and 105 square meters, 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

in the past, it was a common practice for developers to steal balcony areas and give away half of them. however, these two projects have an obvious feature:by "stealing" the equipment platform and the open space, the room ratio of the apartment is greatly improved.

for example, the 72-square-meter apartment of the youth one project has three bedrooms, two living rooms and one bathroom. it is understood that the balcony of the south living room is counted as half of the area, and the south-facing bedroom and the north-facing second bedroom have equipment platforms and lofts, all of which are free. this makes the actual area of ​​the apartment reach 83.4 square meters.

the fanghuali project also made great efforts in balconies, equipment platforms and open spaces, making the free rate of some of its apartment types as high as 19.58%. by directly turning the equipment platforms and structural beams into indoor spaces, the room rate of most apartment types in the two projects exceeded 90%, and the highest even exceeded 100%.

in beijing, where every inch of land is valuable, in addition to equipment platforms, many real estate projects also increase the house ratio by giving away space by converting fire-proof eaves into balconies.such as jianfa guanyun, jingshang lanyuan, pu'er runfu, poly xingchen hexu, poly yijing hexu, etc.

a typical example is poly xingchen hexu, a project jointly developed by poly and beijing construction engineering real estate, located in the sixth phase of the airport land in shunyi district. the first phase was launched in july this year, with apartment types ranging from 110 to 126 to 143 square meters. the project uses two equipment platforms and a fire-proof cantilevered eave to wrap into the interior to steal area.

it is understood that the nominal floor space ratio of the project is around 85%, and if the free fire-proof eaves area is taken into account, the floor space ratio will reach 100%.

not only in shunyi district, jingxi in daxing district also uses odd-even floors to steal fire-proof eaves and steal area. this is the 6021 plot in huangcun section of daxing, which was acquired by china railway real estate and xingchuang real estate for 1.9 billion yuan in december last year. the apartment types include 79-89-99-111-120 square meters.

according to information released online, jingxi is currently the first project in daxing with double north and south balconies, and the community has a housing ratio of up to 95%.

under the new building regulations, the "zero public area" wave is coming

real estate developers are doing everything they can to steal space.on the one hand, it is because of the need to improve product competitiveness and speed up inventory liquidation in a sluggish market; another more important reason is the relaxation of regulatory approval.

in particular, with the destocking of real estate and the rise of the "fourth generation of housing" trend, "zero public area" has become popular in major cities.

the "zero public area" here does not mean to cancel the public area at the policy level, but that real estate developers offset the public area of ​​home buyers through the design of spatial buildings, free areas, etc., so as to achieve the effect of "zero public area" or even "negative public area".

in march 2016, the design institute of tsinghua university proposed the concept of the fourth generation of buildings. since 2019, the ministry of housing and urban-rural development has fully recognized the construction of the fourth generation of housing. in 2021, the china association for engineering construction standardization issued the "urban forest garden housing design standard", and the fourth generation of housing has officially transformed from a concept to a reality with standards and specifications to follow.

conceptually, the "fourth generation of housing", also known as courtyard housing, urban forest garden housing, and three-dimensional ecological housing, refers to a new type of housing that introduces green landscapes into the home, increases neighborhood shared space, and realizes "shared green balconies on every floor" or "every household has a sky garden."

different from the previous three generations of unit-allocated housing, community housing with property management, and elevator housing with better supporting facilities, although it was proposed in the early years, it did not flourish due to the rapid development of the real estate market and the shortage of supply. it was not until the second half of 2021 when the real estate entered a downward cycle and the supply and demand relationship reversed that the fourth generation of housing began to gain widespread attention.

at present, many cities have introduced new building regulations in accordance with the requirements of the fourth generation of housing. among first-tier cities, guangzhou issued the "guangzhou construction project floor area ratio calculation method" in november last year, relaxing the "non-volume" ratio of semi-open spaces. specifically, the proportion of semi-volume area of ​​balconies was increased from "no more than 15%" to 20%, and the size of bay windows was increased to 0.8 meters.

in addition, shenzhen also updated the "shenzhen building design rules" some time ago, specifically reducing the area included in the common area and making dimensional adjustments to the architectural design of balconies and bay windows.

according to incomplete statistics from the media, many cities including shenzhen, foshan, fuzhou, changsha, shaoxing, wenzhou, jinhua, and huzhou have introduced new building planning regulations this year, encouraging developers to build "fourth-generation housing" by reducing the common area, relaxing the balcony size restrictions, and supporting the exclusion of aerial green areas from the plot ratio.

the introduction of these new building regulations has given real estate developers tremendous room for maneuver. the floor area ratio of newly built projects continues to increase, and "zero public area" and "negative public area" become possible.

take guangzhou as an example. after the adjustment of the housing type standard last year, the 100% utilization rate of new houses in guangzhou has become the "standard" this year. it is understood that the housing type utilization rate of new projects recently launched in guangzhou, such as china construction haisi city, future fangzhou, tianhe luyu mansion, poly yajun and other projects, has exceeded 100%.

in addition to relaxing restrictions on open spaces such as balconies and green spaces, some cities have even begun to encourage pricing based on floor area.

in july 2023, hefei proposed that in order to avoid an excessively large proportion of shared areas, it is necessary to actively explore the pricing of commercial housing sales based on the floor area. in may this year, zhaoqing made it clear that commercial housing sales will be priced based on the floor area from may 1, and the public supporting facilities equipped in the planning conditions of new communities will not be included in the floor area ratio. in early september, hunan xiangtan also issued a new policy allowing real estate developers to promote sales based on the floor area of ​​housing.

as the real estate industry enters a new market cycle, true "zero public area" may be in the near future.

the other side of the wave

at the interim results meeting just held, vanke's yu liang said that the current new home product and service capabilities have been greatly improved compared to before, and the industry's product iteration speed has now accelerated to a new generation every 3 or 4 months. developers rolling out products and services is a good thing for consumers.

on the one hand, developers are rolling out products, allowing consumers to buy better and more spacious houses at more affordable prices; on the other hand, real estate companies are also continuously building their product strength, accelerating inventory turnover, winning reputation and market, and even promoting high-quality development of the real estate industry.this seems to be a win-win situation.

at present, many cities have launched pilot plots for the new regulations. on august 28, guangzhou listed the tianhe south flour mill plot. according to the transfer plan, the "half-volume" ratio of the semi-open space of the project can be increased from the original 15% to 20%, and the balcony area can be expanded to 30%, and the floor area ratio is calculated based on half of the horizontal projection area.

in addition to the four first-tier cities, other cities have already started to explore the practice of "fourth-generation housing" earlier. as early as 2017, the country's first fourth-generation housing "july 1st city forest garden" was unveiled in chengdu. since june last year, xi'an, shaanxi, wenzhou, zhejiang, xinyang, henan, longyan, fujian, jiujiang, jiangxi and other places have launched their first "fourth-generation housing".

in july this year, deqing, huzhou, zhejiang, sold the first "fourth-generation residential" land. the land was clearly built as a "fourth-generation residential" land. plot 1 can build a total of 13,800 square meters of sky courtyards, which are not included in the floor area ratio.

judging from the results achieved, these new products have undoubtedly received high market response with their higher cost-effectiveness and better quality.

relevant data shows that in the first half of 2024, the fourth-generation residential buildings of guomao real estate won the semi-annual sales area and amount championship in fuzhou. at the end of last year, longfor launched its first fourth-generation residential product in chongqing, giving away a 45-square-meter sky courtyard. the project was sold out in the first 80 days, breaking many records in chongqing's luxury housing market in terms of amount, unit price, and sales rate in the past two years.

2023 is known as the first year of the explosion of chongqing's "fourth-generation housing". with the introduction of supporting policies for the "fourth-generation housing", the market has also responded quickly, and "fourth-generation housing projects" such as guorui lulinfu, longhu yunhe song, and guanchen qianzhongjin have sprung up like mushrooms after rain.

according to data from relevant institutions, among typical new projects launched in chongqing this year, the sales of fourth-generation residential buildings are significantly better than those of non-fourth-generation residential buildings.the average sales rate of typical fourth-generation residential projects monitored by the agency is 89%, while the average sales rate of non-fourth-generation residential projects is only about 17%.

in the long run, the "fourth generation of housing" and new products built to meet the new regulations will undoubtedly be the mainstream of the real estate market. however, this also leads to another more realistic problem. products that were not built in accordance with the new regulations in the past will face a more severe problem of destocking. this is undoubtedly a big blow to those new and second-hand houses that were sold before last year.

in the past two or three years, as the real estate market continued to decline, the destocking of new homes has become the focus of the whole society. policies have been continuously introduced at the policy level to stimulate the destocking of new homes, and even the government has begun to purchase existing homes for use as affordable housing.

according to statistics from relevant institutions, by the end of 2023, the total inventory of newly built commercial housing in 100 cities across the country will be 505 million square meters. according to data from the national bureau of statistics, by the end of august 2024, the broad inventory area of ​​commercial housing in my country will be 1.92 billion square meters, with a sales cycle of 28 months.