Policies help urbanites put roof over their heads

Guo Xudong was happy that he and his wife could soon move into their dream two-bedroom flat he rented in northwest Beijing, and at less than half the market rate. That came after the newlywed managed to secure a slot this month at the public rental housing program in the capital, which is known for its notoriously high housing costs.

Before that, the young couple－both from outside Beijing－had crammed into a one-bedroom apartment farther from his office. The monthly rent, around 6,000 yuan ($871), is not exceptionally high in first-tier cities, but it was burdensome enough as they looked to save up for a down payment for a property of their own.

"The flat is a nice makeshift home before that happens," said the 29-year-old electronics engineer, who works for a private chip manufacturer in Beijing.

Guo was among the most recent beneficiaries of China's decadeslong effort to provide affordable housing to its fast-ballooning urban population.

Figures provided by the National Statistics Bureau show China had only 170 million city dwellers when it adopted the reform and opening-up policy in 1978. That number jumped to 830 million as of last year, exerting huge pressure on the nation's limited urban housing supply.

In the planned-economy era before 1978, urban housing was mainly built and allocated by the government as a job benefit, and was almost free.

That was a wholesome arrangement at a time when most Chinese had limited income and capacity to buy a home at prices that reflect their market values, according to Wang Wei, head of the Development Research Center of the State Council's market economy division.

But as the central government prioritized economic growth in the following decades, it has decided to tap into the market to increase supplies and to accommodate the influx of urban residents.

In 1994, the central government decided to create a two-track system that features government-subsidized housing, aimed at financially strapped families, and commodity apartments for better-off buyers. At almost the same time, China introduced the Housing Provident Fund Program, which allowed potential homebuyers to save part of their income for a future home. It also entitled them to subsidized mortgage rates.

In the following years, it rolled out more programs to ensure the disadvantaged group's housing security, including the Anju (Comfortable Housing) project that sold tens of millions of flats to low-income people at cost, the public rental housing program and the joint ownership program that allowed young buyers to own homes at lower prices.

Liu Hongyu, head of Tsinghua University's real estate research center, estimated that 200 million people benefited from various forms of affordable housing programs, which is roughly one in every four of the country's urban dwellers.

Experts have noticed a few changes in the policies' beneficiaries over the period.

The younger citizens－many of them white-collar workers with decent incomes－have demonstrated interest in the more recent public rental or joint ownership apartments, which they see as a transitional substitute as they work their way to pricier commodity housing.

Guo, the Beijing electronics engineer, said he expects the long-awaited policy would treat tenants in Beijing the same as homeowners in terms of community services, especially children's schooling.