In some small and medium-sized cities, in order to raise capital leverage ratio, developers tend to pre-sell houses even before they reach pre-sale standards. In some cities, apartments are sold even before construction projects start.

It is against this backdrop the government is beginning to pay more attention to homebuyers' rights and interests, rather than supporting property developers to any great degree. Nanning's pilot to annul the housing pre-sale system is encouraging.

No abrupt decisions

Wu Dingping (www.xinhuanet.com): Doing away with the housing pre-sale system is not enough to prevent encroachment on homebuyers' interests. During the last year we have seen a large amount of poor-quality housing disclosed to the public, the root cause of which is a dearth of dutiful surveillance.

The system does have its rationale. It not only adheres to rules for the development of the real estate market, but also benefits both housing developers and buyers. Thanks to the system, developers can make an earlier recovery of their investment and launch the next housing projects earlier. In this sense, the system increased housing supply and speed up the capital turnover. Since homebuyers paid part of the construction capital in advance, it helped lower housing prices.

The predominant result of scrapping the system will be price rises. If developers are unable to share capital burden with buyers, they will definitely transfer cost increase to the latter.

What's more, annulling the system will inevitably lengthen development duration, which will certainly decrease supply, hence soaring prices.

Zhou Junsheng (Chengdu Business Daily): We cannot deny there are some problems in the application of the housing pre-sale system. For example, size shrinkage, changes in planning and postponed delivery. Some developers even resold sold houses and ran away with the proceeds. These all harmed homebuyers' interests. These are not flaws originating in the system, but its supervision. The government at various levels should shoulder the responsibility of supervising the system, rather than terminating it abruptly.

The major problem in China's housing market is in the huge distance between soaring prices and average people's purchasing power. In response, the government is sparing no effort in curbing price hikes. Unfortunately, annulment of the pre-sale system does not hit the target. Currently, some developers are not selling houses in time because they want to make bigger profits in the future. The government should severely crack down on such behavior. If the system were cancelled, greedy developers will have more excuses to delay selling, which will eventually push up housing prices.

Guo Wenjing (www.qianlong.com): It could be foreseen that annulment of the housing pre-sale system will raise the access threshold for developers and small and medium-sized housing enterprises will be driven out of the market, which will lead to monopoly.

It has been proved that no industry could develop in a healthy manner without fair competition, and monopoly will ultimately cost consumers' interests.

Nowadays, while expensive houses are still in great demand among rich people, price hikes have made house more and more unaffordable for average people. What should be blamed? I think the widening gap between the rich and the poor, rather than the pre-sale system.

The system is not indigenous to China, but originated in Hong Kong. After assessing the system's good and bad points, Hong Kong has strengthened its supervision.

So, why not enhance policy surveillance instead of scrapping the system abruptly?