Three decades ago much of the housing in China’s cities belonged to state-owned enterprises, which provided homes to workers at low rents. A lot has changed since then. China is now blessed, if that is the right word, with a sprawling commercial property market, which has produced vast numbers of flats and equal amounts of drama. Since the height of the last boom in 2020, sales have dropped by more than half. To try to put a floor under the market, China’s government has turned to a new, old solution. It wants state-owned enterprises to step in to buy unsold property and turn it into affordable housing.
