Blood in the Streets

I saw this in the Shanghai Daily yesterday and realized that it's official: there is now blood in the streets all over Western Europe and the US in terms of the property sector:

"Spanish builders are tempting reluctant home buyers with free cars, mortgage holidays and hard cash as they try to lift the crisis-hit housing sector. Some are also diving into the rental market. At this month's annual property fair in Madrid, the number of promoters was down by a third on the previous year, many of them victims of the deepening housing crisis. With fewer buyers milling between models of white-washed housing estates, there were scant queues to see sales representatives." [1]

The question is, why did this appear in the Shanghai Daily? The answer: propaganda. The regulators in China have continued to put enormous pressure on the property sector and as a result, they need to be able to justify their actions. One way to do that successfully is to point the finger at the alternative, which conveniently is much worse right now. In fact, this is great for the government as they take aim at developers and buyers alike in a common chorus, "Slow down."






[1] April 24, 2008 Harding, Ben and Clara Vilar, Copyright Shanghai Daily Information Network