Buyers told to beware of $1 Detroit houses – and more of Today’s China Real Estate Links | April 8, 2013

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

• Buyers told to be careful on $1 house in Detroit

  House for Sale: $1. Location: Detroit. Condition: In need of work. Date Constructed: 1905.
  An April Fool’s Joke? A ploy to get would-be buyers’ attention? Or for real?
  Whatever it was, it got responses, said Lisa Gray, who has worked as a real estate agent in metropolitan Detroit for 13 years. She said she received phone calls every day for that $1 house and other $1 houses that were listed for sale in the financially ailing city two months ago. She put the number of calls at 30 a day, and said all came from Chinese who live in the US or China.

• China Vanke Expanding to U.S. After Customer Emigration

  China Vanke Co. (000002), the biggest developer listed on Chinese exchanges, is expanding outside its home country because of rising housing demand in the U.S. and Canada and a wave of emigration, Chairman Wang Shi said.
  “There are still opportunities in North America,” Wang said today at the China Business Conference at Columbia University in New York. Also, “we follow Vanke’s customers. Many of Vanke’s customers have emigrated abroad. About 30 percent of them have chosen America as the destination.”

• Allianz eyes China, US in property push

  Allianz, Europe’s No. 1 insurer, is scouring Chinese and US real estate as part of an overall plan to buy around 2 billion euros ($2.57 billion) in property assets this year, its head of real estate told Reuters.
  The insurer wants to bring down its exposure to the weak eurozone economy and may buy around 200 to 400 million euros of property in the US and Asia this year, Olivier Piani said in an interview on Friday.

• Top 10 property developers in China 2013

  The Top 500 Chinese Real Estate Developers in 2013 was released on March 22. China Vanke Co., Ltd. retained its champion-position, according to the report from China Real Estate Research Association, China Real Estate Industry Association and China Real Estate Appraisal.

  The performance of the top 100 real estate companies within China has recovered since the second half of 2012 before the overall recovery of the whole market.

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