COFCO sets new land price record in Beijing buy – and more of Today’s China Real Estate Links | July 26, 2013

Here is a list of the day’s latest China real estate news collected from around the web:

• COFCO sets new land price record in Beijing buy

  COFCO Property (Group) Co, the real estate unit controlled by State-owned food company COFCO Corp, bought a 206,000 square meter plot of land in Beijing’s Chaoyang district at 2.36 billion yuan ($384.68 million), the company said in a filing on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange Wednesday.

  The price of the 49,000 square meter commercial building portion of the plot was around 46,000 yuan per square meter, breaking a record set by property developer Sinobo last year when it bought a piece of land for 34,000 yuan per square meter.

• Shanghai land plot fetches 49 percent premium

  A 10,239-square-meter land plot in downtown Hongkou District, designated for office and retail development, fetched 1.044 billion yuan (US$169 million) yesterday, or 49 percent above its starting price, more evidence of the continuous buoyant sentiment in Shanghai’s real estate market.

  Shanghai Sunac Greentown Holding, a joint venture formed last year between Greentown China and Sunac China Holdings, paid an average 26,832 yuan per square meter for the parcel in Tilanqiao area.

• Real estate developer probed for saying “French Concession”

  A property developer in Xuhui District, Shanghai is being investigated for allegedly violating Chinese law and ordered to remove the wording “French Concession” from its advertisements and leaflets, authorities said yesterday.

  Local residents complained that four billboards of a property under construction at the interaction of Xietu Road and Hebao Road boasted that the new development displayed “the splendor of the French Concession,” which, they said, hurt their feelings.

• Shenzhen expected to pilot new property tax soon

  LOCAL real estate agencies said the city will likely soon implement a new property tax following a Central Government announcement that will increase the number of cities piloting property taxes this year.

  But local realtors didn’t see any possibility that a property tax would ease Shenzhen’s rising home prices in the short term.

  Li Jian, a veteran real estate agent based in Nanshan District, said a residential property tax would continue to spike prices of pre-owned homes because home sellers would shift the cost to buyers.

• IMF warns of growing risks to China’s financial system

  The International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) annual report on China, published last week, warns that the world’s second largest economy faces serious financial risks.

  The IMF pointed to the widely cited fears over China’s total loan issuance, which has jumped from 129 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) to 195 percent since 2008. This was a result of Beijing’s desperate response to the initial shock from the Wall Street crash that year.

• Prince Hotels to operate ski resort in China

  Prince Hotels Inc. will become the first Japanese company to operate a ski resort in China.

  The Tokyo-based hotel chain said July 24 the venture in Jilin province, northeastern China, is scheduled to open in December 2014.

This list is updated daily, so tune in again tomorrow for more up to date information.