Tag: Real Estate and Housing (Residential)

China Evergrande Suspends Trading as New Trouble Roils Property Market

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Just a few weeks ago, China Evergrande, the world’s most debt-saddled property developer, was writing its final chapter and working to resolve financial disputes with its creditors. Then a stream of bad news came and the pages were torn up. Staff at the company’s wealth management arm have been detained by the authorities. Two former top executives are reportedly being held and its billionaire chairman is under police surveillance. Investors have fled, selling off their shares and sending the company’s already depressed stock down more than 40 percent over the…

Country Garden, China’s Indebted Developer, Meets Payment Deadline

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Country Garden, China’s biggest property developer, told creditors that it had made a late interest payment, averting an immediate default on its debts and keeping the company financially viable for the time being. Last month, the company missed two interest payments totaling $22.5 million on bonds that had been sold in U.S. dollars. It had a 30-day grace period to make the payment or risk default. The grace period ended this week. Country Garden told the bondholders that it had made the payment within the grace period, a person close…

China’s Biggest Homebuilder Fights to Survive as Economic Crisis Deepens

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When Country Garden, the biggest developer in China’s increasingly troubled real estate sector, published its annual report in April, the cover design exuded hope: a phoenix spreading its wings. The company said the image showed that China’s economy was “back on track” and that this year would see “growth soaring to new heights.” That was wishful thinking. Shortly after the report’s release, China’s nascent economic recovery lost steam and an already sluggish real estate market started to collapse. At Country Garden, presales of unfinished apartments, a crucial indicator of future…

China’s Country Garden Sells Stock to Pay Debts

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The embattled Chinese homebuilder Country Garden said on Wednesday it planned to raise $34 million by issuing new shares, its latest effort to get a handle on its debt problems and contain a deepening property crisis that is weighing on China’s economy. In a filing with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, Country Garden said it planned to issue 350.6 million shares of the company at 77 Hong Kong cents apiece next Wednesday. The proceeds will not go to the company. Instead, they will go to a subsidiary of Hong Kong-based…

China’s Property Crisis Is Rippling Through the Economy

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Once a beneficiary of China’s property boom, Lan Mingqiang is now an unwitting casualty of its unraveling. The financial troubles at one real estate company, Country Garden, have left him unable to pay the school fees for his son, who is starting seventh grade. Country Garden owes $21,000 to his company, which makes fences and billboards on construction sites. Now, with Country Garden days away from a default, this money is more out of reach than ever. “Nowadays, real estate is hard,” Mr. Lan said. He recently gave up on…

What to Know About China’s Real Estate Crisis

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Tremors in China’s real estate market are shaking the country’s economy, as well as the world, which has come to rely on China as a reliable engine of growth. Major developers are faltering as they face huge losses, struggle with mountains of debt and miss payments to lenders. A long-running building boom that propelled China’s growth has come to a halt, threatening the jobs and savings of millions of households. China’s markets have tumbled and its currency has weakened as officials take action to spur growth. Here’s what you need…

Chinese Confidence Hits Low Point Because of Nation’s Economic Troubles

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When their government abruptly ended its harsh Covid measures in December, many Chinese expected a robust rebound from pent-up demand. Eight months later, China is instead facing an accumulation of bad news: record youth unemployment, a deep housing slump, stagnant spending, even deflation. That’s a shock to many Chinese who are used to an economy that kept on expanding and living standards that rose with it. Now they’re contending with slowing businesses and shrinking personal fortunes. I talked to over a dozen business owners and consumers, as I have been…

China Central Bank Cuts Key Interest Rate on Bank Lending

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China’s central bank on Monday cut the main benchmark interest rate that the country’s commercial banks use in issuing one-year bank loans, the latest in a series of steps by the government to address falling apartment prices, weak consumer spending and broad debt troubles. But the reduction, the second time in two months that the government has pushed down commercial banks’ lending rates, was smaller than expected. The modest cut was the latest sign that the government’s usual tools for addressing an economic slowdown may have lost some of their…

China Faces a Crisis in Its Real Estate Sector

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A model Chinese property developer in a sector replete with risk takers is teetering on the edge of default. Short of cash, one of China’s biggest asset managers has missed payments to investors. And billions of dollars have flowed out of the country’s stock markets. In China, August has been a dizzying ride. What started three years ago as a crackdown on risky business behavior by home builders, and then an ensuing housing slowdown, has spiraled rapidly this month. The broader economy has been threatened, and the confidence of consumers,…

In China, Artists Create Miniature Homes From Memories

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Not long after Shen Peng’s grandfather died, his grandmother visited the site of the house where she and her husband once lived. The government had demolished the house, in northern China, nearly 15 years before as part of a redevelopment project. The site still hadn’t been developed, and she could barely walk around the family’s old plot because the grass was so overgrown. Mr. Shen wondered: Could he help her relive her memories another way? For more than six months, he labored in secret after his day job as a…