Hong Kong authorities repossess 330 public rental flats, 40 errant tenants to be penalised
- Housing Authority says reclaimed flats came from the first batch of about 88,000 tenants who made declarations about whether they owned residential property
- Government also randomly inspected 30,000 households and 40 were found to have owned a property in the city without notifying authorities
Hong Kong authorities have repossessed about 330 public rental flats and will penalise another 40 tenants who failed to declare their property ownership, after stepping up efforts against the abuse of government housing resources last year.
The Housing Authority on Tuesday said public rental flats it reclaimed came from the first batch of about 88,000 tenants who were required to declare whether they owned any residential property in Hong Kong last October and November.
“As of mid-January, we have collected around 87,000 or 99.6 per cent of the declaration forms,” said Director of Housing Rosanna Law Shuk-pui, who is also the vice-chairwoman of the authority.
“Due to the new measures, around 330 flats have been returned or retrieved by us.”
Some of the reasons for taking rental homes back included tenants having purchased private homes and cases of migration, Law said.