The minimum down payment of Guangzhou Provident Fund for ＂recognizing the house but not the loan＂ is 20%, which affects the geometry？

　　Following Shanghai and Beijing, Guangzhou, a first-tier city, has also implemented the provident fund policy of "recognizing housing but not loans". In addition, compared with Beijing and Shanghai, Guangzhou’s policy went further. For the first home, the minimum down payment ratio was reduced from 30% to 20%.

　　On November 14th, Guangzhou Housing Provident Fund Management Center issued the Notice on Optimizing Personal Housing Provident Fund Loans (hereinafter referred to as the Notice). The "Notice" mentioned that the number of housing units under the family name is accounted for by the "Guangzhou Natural Person Real Estate (Land, Housing) Information Query Results" provided by the Guangzhou Real Estate Registration Agency. In other words, families without housing who have had a loan or purchase record before can now buy a house for the first time and enjoy a preferential down payment ratio for the first time. For example, for families with "sell one and buy one" replacement needs, they can already enjoy the low down payment ratio discount for the first purchase through provident fund loans when replacing houses.

　　The "Notice" clarifies that the minimum down payment ratio of provident fund loans is 20% (originally 30%) for buyers who purchase the first home in Guangzhou; The minimum down payment ratio of provident fund loans is 30% for the families of buyers who have no housing loans (including commercial housing loans and provident fund loans, the same below) or whose housing loan records have been settled and own a house in Guangzhou; The minimum down payment ratio of provident fund loans is 40% for the families of buyers who have outstanding housing loan records and own one house in Guangzhou. The Notice shall come into force as of the date of issuance and shall be valid for 5 years.

　　In addition, the official has also interpreted the contents of the Notice: the number of housing units under the family name is only calculated in Guangzhou, but not in other places; The nationwide housing loan records (whether settled or not) no longer affect the identification of housing units; Those who buy the third and above houses in Guangzhou will not be granted housing provident fund loans; When calculating the number of housing units under the family name, the houses that have been sold and are no longer under the family name are not included; There is no difference in the minimum down payment ratio between ordinary housing and non-ordinary housing, and the same minimum down payment ratio applies; For the housing provident fund loans being handled, if the housing provident fund loans have not been mortgaged, you can apply to the original loan handling outlets according to the "Notice" policy, modify the information or cancel the loans and re-apply.

　　Yan Yuejin, research director of Yiju Research Institute, said that "admitting housing but not lending" was mainly reflected in housing commercial loans. After the promulgation of this policy, "admitting housing but not lending" has covered the field of provident fund loans, which will help to release the demand for improved housing.

　　Since the introduction of the new real estate policy in late August and mid-September, the transaction area of commercial housing in Guangzhou has obviously rebounded. According to the data of the Central Finger Research Institute, in October 2023, the transaction area of new houses in Guangzhou was about 712,000 ㎡, up by 35.2% year-on-year. However, in November, the policy influence began to weaken, and the market enthusiasm of new houses decreased. The transaction area of new houses in Zhou Du has been declining for two consecutive weeks.

　　Yang Hongxia, general manager of the South China Branch of the Central Finger Research Institute, said that the release of the new provident fund loan policy in Guangzhou will further promote the market rigidity and the effective release of improved demand. The introduction of the new policy of Guangzhou provident fund will release a positive signal to the market, which will help stabilize market expectations, boost the sentiment of buyers and promote the stable and healthy development of Guangzhou real estate market.

　　"The decline in real estate sales and the payment of employee provident fund as usual have led to a relatively high water level in the provident fund pool. From the perspective of policy formulation, it is inevitable to consider how to make better use of this part of inefficient or even idle funds." Li Yujia, a researcher at the Guangdong Housing Policy Research Center, said that the low interest rate of provident fund loans can stimulate the enthusiasm of buying houses, and the implementation of the optimization policy of provident fund loans is a general trend.

　　In contrast, Guangzhou Provident Fund has taken a bigger step than commercial loans in the implementation of the policy of "recognizing houses but not loans", because at present, the down payment ratio of the first commercial housing loan in Guangzhou generally needs 30%, and only a few banks can 20%; For families who already own a house and buy a house again, the down payment for commercial loans needs 40%. "Because local governments have greater autonomy in the provident fund policy." Li Yujia said.

　　At the same time, Li Yujia said that it is necessary to look at the effects of the above policies objectively. "Some demand will be released, but the scale of this demand is not particularly large." Li Yujia believes that whether the new Guangzhou provident fund loan policy can play a greater role in the property market depends on whether the paid employees can get enough loans. In the case of limited personal and family loans (the maximum personal loan is 600,000 yuan and the maximum family loan is 1 million yuan), the high probability of buying a house in Guangzhou still needs to take the form of "provident fund+business" combined loan, and the effect of the policy may not be so high. In addition, most of the people who can get such a high loan amount are staff in the system or employees of state-owned enterprises and institutions. Most of these people have already bought houses (mainly new employees will release some demand), but those who really need provident fund, low-interest loans are mainly new citizens, young people and migrants, but these people have a small deposit balance and a low deposit ratio, so it is difficult to get full loans.

　　Compared with the down payment ratio of commercial loans, the current down payment ratio of Guangzhou provident fund loans is relatively low. It is not clear whether the down payment ratio of portfolio loans is implemented according to the standards stipulated by provident fund loans or commercial loans. A real estate agent told CBN that it depends on how the bank implements it, and it will only be known after consulting the housing provident fund center. In addition, some real estate agents said that portfolio loans should be implemented in accordance with the standards of commercial loans, and the down payment of 20% needs pure provident fund loans to be implemented.

　　Because the loan amount of many houses in Guangzhou will exceed the maximum amount of provident fund loans, it is necessary to adopt combined loans. Some real estate agents said that if the down payment ratio is implemented according to the standards of commercial loans, this policy will not have much impact on real estate transactions with mortgage loans exceeding 1 million yuan, and it will not have much impact on the property market.

　　In addition, according to the statistics of the Central Finger Research Institute, as of November 13th, more than 250 policies related to provident fund have been issued in various places this year, and more than 30 cities have optimized the standard of "recognizing housing and repaying loans" for provident fund loans, among which more than 20 cities have implemented "recognizing housing but not repaying loans" for provident fund loans (including Shanghai and Beijing), and reduced the down payment ratio of provident fund loans in many places.