'Nail house' family defies the traffic, and officials, in battle for compensation

The house of Xu Jun forces Huting North Road, a four-lane highway in Jiuting town of Shanghai municipality, to narrow to two lanes around the building. It is known as the city's most notorious 'nail house' but Xu doesn't like the nickname and feels embarrassed and helpless about his family's situation.

Why don't you want to move?

It's because the local government is offering me only one-tenth of the price of houses sold in the area. My family built and owns two buildings, one of three storeys and the other two storeys. We also have land-use rights on a 176-square-metre plot on which they stand. In rural areas, many farmers have the right to use the land owned by the collective to build their estates, and this kind of land is called zhaijidi (house foundation land). The Jiuting town government sent us a notice saying it will give us 800,000 yuan (HK$955,200) if we move out. We can't accept this. If you look around, you'll find that property prices have already shot up to 26,000 yuan per square metre. Officials from the demolition office have also offered to let us buy the rights to use a 132-square-metre plot for 100,000 yuan. We can't agree to this, either. Our zhaijidi is larger. Another fact they ignore is that the first floor of the houses were leased to small businesses. I can get 200,000 yuan from the rental. If I move, I will lose this important revenue source.

But your previous neighbours all agreed to leave

The government started to expand the road in 2009. In the beginning, the houses of 10 families were tagged for demolition. At the end of last year, two families were still holding out. I guess most other households agreed to move out because they have family members working in the government and can get a lucrative deal to move. In January, the owners of the next-to-last nail house, which stood next to mine, signed to leave because their son will marry soon, and they didn't want to live in such terrible conditions. As for my family, we are ordinary, grass-roots people and don't have a single relative who's an official. We told cadres who have visited us more than 30 times that their offer is below the current market price. They always respond that they have to obey a 2002 regulation issued by the Songjiang district government, which governs Jiuting town. We definitely want to leave as early as possible, but we can't accept their proposal.

How's your life in this house?