A city official in Chongqing Municipality said the local government wants every family there to be able to afford a house with just six-and-a-half years of income.

Huang Qifan, vice-mayor and member of the Standing Committee of the CPC Chongqing Municipal Committee, made the bold declaration during a forum Sunday and explained how it would be possible.

"If the home price is much higher than most people's income, Chongqing is not a city suitable for living," Huang said.

"The government will invest 600 billion yuan ($88 billion) to develop Chongqing into a city suitable for living in the next four to five years, which include 100 billion yuan for house removal and relocation."

Some local residents quickly dismissed that as just a weak promise.

"The monthly income of our family is about 3,000 yuan, and the cheapest house in Chongqing is about 3,000 yuan per square meter," said Li Rong, 40, a Chongqing resident.

"According to the national housing standard of 30 square meters per person, it's impossible to buy a 90 square meter house for a family of three within six years," Li said.

Huang said the government will control land price, which cannot exceed one-sixth of economically affordable home prices, one-fifth of middle and low-level home prices and one-third of high-end home prices.

"About one-fifth to one-third of urban citizens will benefit from the housing policies," he said.

Huang also said investment in real estate cannot exceed 25 percent of the city's fixed assets investment every year, and the figure reached 24.5 percent in 2009.

Xu Zhijun, spokesman at Beijing Municipal Commission of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, said on Monday that Beijing would ensure more people are able to buy homes and improve regulation of the real estate industry.

Based on government statistics, a real estate agency said that home cost to income ratio in Beijing was now 27 to 1 in August, five times more than the international average. That means a family of two wage earners could afford a home with 27 years of wages.

"The high ratio of home price to income is a nationwide problem. Property price is also abnormally high in second and third-tier cities," Liu Weixin, an urban development specialist at the China Society of Urban Economy in Beijing, told the Global Times.

"The government should ease the investment and speculation in real estate industry and ensure more residents can afford houses," he said.

(Global Times September 8, 2009)