China's housing markets among world's most expensive
Seven of the world's top ten least affordable housing markets are in China, according to calculations by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Based on the IMF house price to wage ratio — which measures average housing prices in a particular city against average disposable incomes — houses in Chinese Tier 1 cities are far more expensive than those in developed markets. The Chinese cities listed among the top 10 most unaffordable markets are Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Tianjin, Guangzhou and Chongqing. For instance, the mid-range price of a New York apartment is 6.2 times more than the annual earnings of an average New Yorker, while an average Beijinger would need to fork out 22.3 years of earnings to pay off their apartment. Notably, residential property is one of the biggest concerns of the Chinese government. Despite the introduction of measures to curb housing inflation, new home prices still rose 7.4 percent last month, or the highest recorded increase since December 2012. Meanwhile, other cities featured in the top 15 are Tokyo, Sydney, London and New York. Rounding off the list are Los Angeles, Toronto, Wellington and Singapore.
Romesh Navaratnarajah, Senior Editor at PropertyGuru, wrote this story. To contact him about this or other stories email romesh@allproperty.com.sg
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