The Development Bureau has made it clear the government has no plans to rein in the construction of micro flats, or “shoebox” flats. This may be good news to aspiring homeowners who can no longer afford normal living spaces. But it is bad news for an ageing population. Tiny homes are a disincentive for formation of new family households. And most buyers have little hope in the short term of being able to trade up in one of the world’s most expensive markets. Ironically, government policy curbs on speculative demand for luxury flats is partly responsible for developers switching to small flats and for allowing sizes to be compressed to increase supply. A new report by a civic research group highlights the problem. It says developers have built more than 8,500 flats no bigger than 260 sq ft in the past decade – more than half of them in the past four years. In 2019 this accounted for more than 1,800 flats, or 13 per cent of private housing supply. Liber Research Community, which focuses on land and housing issues, says Hong Kong should follow countries such as Singapore and Britain to discourage building of shoebox homes. They lack a walled kitchen and bedroom, and about 70 per cent have a “dark toilet” – a windowless bathroom that uses a mechanical system for airing. A breakdown can cause sanitation problems. Most come from private redevelopment of old urban areas. Henderson Land Development, which is responsible for about a third of them, says the strategy meets a demand from small families and aspiring homeowners and would change in response to market shifts. The Development Bureau says the priority is to increase housing supply to meet residents’ basic needs, and that society could explore a standard for living spaces when the land shortage eased. The reality is that most of these flats are so small they are like legalised subdivided flats. The argument that there is a demand for them is a little disingenuous. Open plan, ‘dark toilets’: how nano flats have lowered Hong Kong living standards The real reason is that the prices of more liveable flats are so out of reach for most people, especially the young, that they can only afford micro flats. They may not be suitable for family planning, but they still yield high profit margins for developers. The government can claim further progress in the quest for affordable housing, such as finding enough land to meet a shortfall of 301,000 public housing units in the next decade. But it is not clear how the uncontrolled development of shoebox flats helps. It sounds as if more developers will build them for profit, resulting in a waste of land and resources and social problems in the long run. The government has to strike a balance between demand and supply and free-market principles. That does not rule out policies that are socially sensitive and forward-looking in the public interest. The time to consider curbs on micro flats is now, not in a distant future when supply of land for housing is no longer an issue.