Hopeless in Hong Kong: why the sordid state of housing can never be fixed in Asia’s world city
- Yonden Lhatoo struggles to understand how the government can officially admit that property prices are out of control, but its priority is the extradition bill and a completely unnecessary political crisis of its own making
Let us all lift our eyes up to the ivory towers within which our government is ensconced and give thanks to it for finally and effectively acknowledging what we the people knew already – Hong Kong’s housing situation has gone to hell.
Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.
Home prices in the world’s most expensive housing market have skyrocketed 126 per cent over the past 22 years, surpassing the obscene heights we last saw in 1997. That was just before the bubble burst, courtesy of the Asian financial crisis, which taught us a few lessons about greed that have long since been forgotten.
“Property prices are still mostly out of reach for Hongkongers,” Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po admitted recently.
Thank you, Captain Obvious, but let’s give him credit for officially putting it on the record now.
Mortgages have become bottomless pits that devour nearly 70 per cent of incomes among those who are desperate or foolhardy enough to buy homes in these ridiculous times.
Astronomical prices continue to explore the furthest reaches of outer space, boldly going where no decent man has gone before and alienating an entire population of unfortunates who can only fantasise about owning that most basic of human comforts – a roof over one’s head.
Her sudden obsession with the extradition bill has apparently sidelined her promise to put the focus on livelihood issues, housing being the biggest and most demanding, when she took over the reins of the city nearly two years ago.
61 sq ft flats in Hong Kong? Why not just bury us in coffins and be done with it?
Tens of thousands are taking to the streets in a public backlash against the bill because of an almost pathological mistrust of the justice system and human rights track record across the border.
I can’t fathom why Lam would invite needless grief by stirring up a hornets’ nest and precipitating a political crisis entirely of her own construction when she can’t even fix basic habitation. Talk about not being able to see the wood for the trees.
It all boils down to an antiquated system under which our government cannot wean itself off the diseased teat of its overreliance on land sales for revenue. It’s long overdue for an overhaul.
Lantau Tomorrow Vision is arguably city’s most important and controversial project
Sure, there are grand plans for massive land reclamation to build satellite towns, but they’re decades away and people continue to suffer in discomfort and indignity in the meantime.
The solution is a political one and any revamp of the system will require the courage to take on powerful property tycoons who continue to game it, whether by hoarding land or putting “homes” less than 200 sq ft in size on the market, passing them off as fit for humans. It’s just outrageous.
At this rate why not just lay us out in rows of coffins and be done with it? We can sleep and die in them like homeless vampires, except that all the bloodsucking can be left to those who have no qualms about putting profits before people.
Yonden Lhatoo is the chief news editor at the Post
