Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Chinese Mandarin - China unveils rules to regulate foreign investment in real estate

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BIZCHINA / Construction

China unveils rules to regulate foreign investment in real estate

By ()
Updated: 2007-06-14 16:56

China's Ministry of Commerce listed a number of measures to ensure
control over direct investment of foreign fund in the real estate sector,
as the country strives to avoid international speculative money to create
bubbles in the sector.

Local commerce departments should strictly limit foreign investment in
luxury real estate, the ministry said in a document published on its
website Wednesday.

It reiterated foreign investors need to establish a real estate company
before they can invest in real estate projects, and they should also get
approvals from relevant department to expand their business scope in
order to invest in new real estate projects.

The ministry said foreign investors are not allowed to bypass the above
regulations by investing in domestic real estate companies via
acquisition or changing the real controller of the domestic companies.

The ministry required local departments to report their approval of the
establishment of foreign-funded real estate companies to the ministry.
The ministry would investigate into the cases and deal with irregular
cases.

The country has been trying to provide proper housing for the public by
building more economically affordable apartments and curbing the rapidly
rising housing prices.

However, the sales prices of new houses rose by around six percent year
on year in 70 mainland's cities including Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen
in the first three months this year.

(For more biz stories, please visit Industry Updates)

Chinese Mandarin

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