Transitional housing plan light on details
- Officials must provide all the information needed to ease the concerns of lawmakers who are unhappy with the cost of the projects
What is good news to some may be bad news to others. The sluggish property market in Hong Kong is a case in point. The suggestion by some property agents that housing prices may dip further is certainly welcome news to potential buyers but a nightmare for those seeking to sell.
To many living in tiny subdivided flats, however, market trends are of little concern. They are already paying through the nose to live in shoebox-sized cubicles while waiting desperately for government-subsidised housing to become available.
If there is any good news to offer these tenants, it would come from efforts to speed up the queue for public rental flats. In a welcome step, the government is to seek lawmakers’ approval for HK$32 billion (US$4.1 billion) in construction and operation costs for 30,000 transitional units under the “light public housing” scheme in the next five years.
Officials hope the waiting time for public flats will be reduced from the existing 5.6 years to 4.5 years by 2026-27 as a result.
With the full details yet to be made available, lawmakers were understandably concerned with the cost effectiveness of the projects. Even though these “no-frills”, prefabricated units are supposed to be simpler than traditional ones, they are by no means cheaper.