The property market

Cat and house

Soaring house prices continue to pose a political problem for China’s leaders

May 4th 2013 | SHANGHAI | From the print edition

1  ASK ordinary people about their own Chinese dream, and you find owning a home is high on the list. But years of rising house prices have put that dream out of reach of many. A slowing economy appeared to take some of the heat out. Now, alas¹, the residential property market is soaring again (see chart). A new survey of developers and property firms on May 2nd showed average house prices up more than 5% in April on a year earlier.

    Words and Phrases|单词短语

• alas n. You use alas to say that you think that the facts you are talking about are sad or unfortunate. （表示悲伤、怜悯等）哎呀，唉

2  Taking the long view, rising property values seem defensible. The country is undergoing the largest wave of urbanisation in human history and homes must be built for all of those new city dwellers. The existing housing stock is poor, so people upgrade to modern homes as soon as they can afford them. Local governments earn a lot of money from land sales to developers and investors have few other places to park their money. All that suggests upward pressure on prices is not going away.

3  But even if you accept those long-term arguments, says Alistair Thornton of IHS, a consultancy, the market right now looks increasingly as if it is becoming detached² from the fundamentals, as speculators looking for an investment swamp buyers looking for somewhere to live. Many flats sit vacant despite legions³ of prospective buyers desperately seeking affordable housing. Capital Economics, a research firm, estimates that investment in residential property accounted for 8.8% of China’s GDP in 2012.

    Words and Phrases|单词短语

• detach v. If you detach one thing from another that it is fixed to, you remove it. If one thing detaches from another, it becomes separated from it.拆卸;(使)分开;(使)分离
• legion n. A legion of people or things is a great number of them. 众多；大批；大量

4  The alarm bells are being rung in unexpected quarters. Wang Shi, the charismatic⁴ boss of Vanke, China’s biggest property developer, would seem to have more to gain than most from further price rises, yet he too warns of a looming “disaster.” The plunge in prices that would result from a pricking of this bubble, he declared on “60 Minutes”, an American television programme, could lead to popular protests on the scale of the recent Arab uprisings.

    Words and Phrases|单词短语

• charismatic adj. A charismatic person attracts, influences, and inspires people by their personal qualities. 有魅力的;有感召力的

5  China’s new leaders <u>are keenly attuned to</u> such concerns and are trying hard to <u>head off</u> the danger. The ruling State Council and the country’s central bank have issued numerous decrees⁵ in recent weeks designed to dampen the market and to crack down on speculation. Among these are larger down-payments and higher mortgage rates for people buying second homes and a reminder to local governments that a 20% capital-gains tax on second-home sales must be enforced.

    Words and Phrases|单词短语

• decree n. A decree is an official order or decision, especially one made by the ruler of a country. 法令;政令
• be attuned to adj. If you are attuned to something, you can understand and appreciate it. 适应的;理解的;与…合拍的
• head off adj. If you head something off, especially something unpleasant, you take action before it is expected to happen in order to prevent it from happening. 阻止，防止（尤指不愉快的事）发生

6  But plenty of central-government edicts⁶ are ignored. The capital-gains tax on resales, for example, was only rarely levied in the past. Ren Zhiqiang, boss of Hua Yuan Real Estate Group, another property giant, recently denounced the country’s policies. The central government’s message to local officials, he claimed, could be described as: “We hope prices won’t continue rising; you go and fix them; and if you don’t fix them, we will punish you.”

    Words and Phrases|单词短语

• edict n. An edict is a command or instruction given by someone in authority. 法令

7  Most local officials do not want to implement such curbs with any rigour. On the contrary, encouraging a property boom keeps much-needed tax revenues flowing and <u>puffs up</u> the local economic growth figures on which their chances of promotion hang. This misalignment⁷ of incentives, argues Mr Thornton, explains why “it’s always a cat-and-mouse game between local and central authorities”.

    Words and Phrases|单词短语

• misalignment n. 错位
• puff up adj. If part of your body puffs up as a result of an injury or illness, it becomes swollen. 膨胀

8  Clearing up this mess will be difficult, but not impossible. A good start would be to introduce a property tax, imposed annually, that is based on the market value of a home. That would reduce speculation, discourage owners from holding empty flats and provide a fresh source of funding for cash-strapped local governments. That should reassure officials whose path to the senior ranks of the party is connected to their ability to enrich their districts (and perhaps themselves) along the way.

9  The perverse incentives the party clings to and the absence of policies to discourage speculation often end up crushing the dreams of would-be home owners. The solution probably starts with the central government recognising that local officials have their dreams, too.

    Structure Analysis|结构分析

• 初步引入
  1.首先说明买房是中国人的梦想之一，引入了放假过高这一主题。
• 具体介绍
  2/3.具体说明现在中国正在进行城市化，然而现实是很多需要买房的人却买不起空置的房屋，而政府却从房地产中获取了大量的利益。
  4/5.说明近期的房价引起了地产商以及中央的担忧并做出相关举措。
• 深入分析
  6/7.事实上法律法规得不到很好的执行，本地政府相反鼓励房价的提升以获取利益。
• 评析总结
  8/9.当下的方法则是政府出台税法以及政府通过升迁制度的改变来实现对房价的控制。

    Complicated Sentences|长难句

• But even if you accept those long-term arguments, says Alistair Thornton of IHS, a consultancy, the market right now looks increasingly as if it is becoming detached from the fundamentals, as speculators looking for an investment swamp buyers looking for somewhere to live.
• 先是一个让步状语从句，主句the market right now looks increasingly后面接着两个宾语从句，形象的表现出投机者与买房者的区别，形成对比。
• On the contrary, encouraging a property boom keeps much-needed tax revenues flowing and puffs up the local economic growth figures on which their chances of promotion hang.
• 首先是动名词作为主语，接着用了两个短语keep... flowing和puff up描述了相关情况，句尾为一个定语从句修饰growth figures。