Financial Services Association, April 17 (Reporter Li Jie) After increasing the maximum loan amount for the Provident Fund to purchase low-carbon green buildings, Beijing has further explored a new angle of relaxation around the Provident Fund loan policy.

On April 17, the Beijing Housing Provident Fund Management Center issued the “Notice on Optimizing the Approval Criteria for Housing Provident Fund Loan Terms after the Renovation of Old Neighborhoods”, which clearly “supports the purchase of housing in old neighborhoods and the completion of “comprehensive energy-saving renovation”, “seismic and energy saving comprehensive renovation”, “individual renovation and environmental remediation”, and “dilapidated building renovation” renovation projects in comprehensive renovation of old neighborhoods when applying for loans.

In addition, the loan term approval standard was reduced from the loan term below the remaining period of use of the house by three years, and optimized to less than the remaining period of use of the land by three years.

Specifically, the land use period for residential buildings is 70 years, and depending on the construction structure, there is a certain difference in the length of use of houses (50 years for brick-mixed structure/60 years for steel-mixed structures). After this policy optimization, the provident fund loan period will increase by 10-20 years.

“With the extension of the loan term of the Provident Fund, the loan amount will also increase, helping buyers to better enjoy the benefits brought by the low interest rate of the Provident Fund, and can also better meet the reasonable housing loan needs of buyers.” Chen Wenjing, director of market research at the China Index Research Institute, said.

“The current Beijing Provident Fund policy targets the 'old' and small 'properties that are now more difficult to sell.” Zhang Dawei, chief analyst at Central Plains Real Estate, said that for “old and small” properties in Beijing's Fourth Ring Road that are over 30 years old, the average monthly salary of buyers can be reduced by 500 yuan per month after the New Deal.

According to Zhang Dawei's estimates, the biggest impact of this new deal is on people who previously used commercial loans to buy old neighborhoods. Based on 1.2 million monthly payments for 30 years, after implementing the new policy, they can save about 230,000 yuan in interest over 30 years.

“After the implementation of the New Deal, some groups were able to move from 'not being able to loan' to the stage of 'getting a loan'. Some groups have extended loan terms or increased loan amounts, which has lowered the threshold for buying a home to a certain extent, which is conducive to stimulating the release of demand for home purchases and boosting trading activity in old neighborhoods.” Guan Rongxue, a senior analyst at Zhuge Data Research Center, said.

According to data from Central Plains Real Estate, four types of renovation projects that meet the requirements of the Beijing Provident Fund policy have now completed more than 400,000 homes in more than 800 residential areas. According to the plan, Beijing starts and completes renovation projects every year in more than 200 residential areas, involving nearly 100,000 homes.

“With the completion of the renovation of old neighborhoods, the period of use of housing will be extended. The current Beijing Provident Fund Policy will effectively solve the problem of short loan terms in housing transactions in old neighborhoods, help reduce the pressure on borrowers to buy and repay, and can better support housing consumption.” Chen Wenjing said,

In fact, since April, first-tier cities have frequently introduced policies for provident funds. Among them, Beijing has increased the amount of provident fund loans for the purchase of green buildings, and Guangzhou has increased the amount of provident fund loans.

“Currently, the real estate market in first-tier cities is also under pressure to adjust, so we will continue to introduce supporting policies.” A real estate industry analyst said.

Judging from the data released by the Bureau of Statistics, housing prices in first-tier cities are still declining month-on-month, but the decline has narrowed somewhat.

On April 16, housing price data for 70 cities released by the Bureau of Statistics showed that in March, new housing prices in first-tier cities fell 0.1% month-on-month, and the decline was 0.2 percentage points narrower than the previous month; second-hand housing prices fell 0.7% month-on-month, and the decline was 0.1 percentage points narrower than the previous month.

Among them, Shanghai led 70 cities with a month-on-month increase of 0.5%; new housing prices in Beijing remained flat month-on-month; Shenzhen fell 0.4% month-on-month; and new housing prices in Guangzhou dropped significantly, reaching 0.7% month-on-month.

Analysts believe that at present, there is still room for optimization of first-tier city policies, such as optimizing purchase restriction policies according to market conditions and district policies, abolishing purchase restrictions in the suburbs, reducing the number of social security period requirements, increasing the number of units purchased by specific groups of people, and optimizing restrictions on home purchases through divorce and specific needs.

“This year's real estate market is different from last year. The popularity will slowly pick up, and the pace of price recovery will also be slow. There is still no momentum for a steady recovery in the short term. It is expected that as policy support for improved housing needs continues to increase, the intensive release of property market policies may drive a gradual recovery in market sentiment.” Guan Rongxue said.