Addressing the ridicule sparked online recently, CPPCC National Committee member Dr. Chen Hongtian responds, "Time will tell, there was no property market bubble on the whole before 2013."

2019.03.07

Dr. Chen Hongtian, a CPPCC National Committee member, a Justice of the Peace, and Chairman of the Cheung Kei Group.

During the 2009 NPC & CPPCC Annual Sessions, Dr. Chen Hongtian had said during a press interview, "There is no bubble in the current property pricing trends. In physics, the bubble is a phenomenon that can shrink and expand, and it bursts immediately upon touch. If you can beat something over and over without bursting it, then you can't call it a bubble, technically speaking. The government has adopted various regulatory measures over the past few years, and the pricing of the property market is still strong on the whole, this shows that there has been no bubble to begin with. This is the most basic concept in economics."

Dr. Chen Hongtian then illustrated his opinion with a calculation: assuming that the floor price of a property is 5000 yuan, the construction cost is 3000 yuan, the management fees is 2000 yuan, and the tax expense is 3000 yuan, then its total cost would be 13000 yuan. And if the price of the property is 14000 yuan, then it is inaccurate to say that there is a property price bubble.

It has been ten years since Dr. Chen Hongtian has made that statement, and the prices of property in China has increased twofold or threefold; time has proven that the viewpoint made by Dr. Chen a decade ago was professional and spot-on.