China to allow its citizens to purchase overseas properties 中国政府即将放开公民个人境外购房的限制

As a part of the China’s planned financial reforms on the so called capital account, China has not expressly allowed its citizens to purchase overseas properties, despite some attempts in the past by some local government, which were called off by the central government.

October 30, China Central Bank together with some other central ministries issued a new notice on further pushing forwards the financial reforms in Shanghai Free Trade Zone in which it is mentioned that:

III. study and initiate the pilot program of allowing qualified domestic individuals to make outbound invests, step up the detailed implementation rules at appropriate time, allowing qualified domestic individuals to make investments in foreign industrial, property and financial markets.

As the first explicit notice from the top, it is expecting that the policy will come real soon. However, the cautious sentiments are clearly indicated in the wording.

First of all, this new policy is so far confined to be effective in the Shanghai Free Trade Zone, and may be quickly rolled over in other free trade zones in China such as Shenzhen, Tianjin etc.

Second, the government will set up a threshold to allow only a small portion of wealthy Chinese to make the investment. It is hard to predict what kind of the criteria will be set up therefor.

Thirdly, the notice does not give a clear time table for this policy to materialize. It may take time to put this policy in practice.

This is definitely a strong auspicious token to foreign real estate developers and realtors who have already embarked on the path to court Chinese buyers for some time.

作为中国金融改革的一部分，中国境内个人投资购买境外不动产一直蠢蠢欲动。之前有点地方政府进行试点，后被中央叫停。其中值得玩味。

但最近，中国人民银行、商务部、银监会、证监会、保监会、外汇局、上海市人民政府日前正式印发《进一步推进中国（上海）自由贸易试验区金融开放创新试点 加快上海国际金融中心建设方案》，其中提到：

（三）研究启动合格境内个人投资者境外投资试点，适时出台相关实施细则，允许符合条件的个人开展境外实业投资、不动产投资和金融类投资。

作为一种正式下发的中央部委的文件，个人购买境外房地产之政策犹抱琵琶半遮面，似乎终于要出台了。

但从文件文字表述看，这一政策显然还是会比较谨慎。中国个人的资本外流早已是公开的秘密。中国的资金早已推高了境外不少地方的房地产价格。这些钱到底如何流入境外房地产市场的，值得思考。但显然，堵不如疏。

个人认为，这一政策的具体实施细则并不一定会立马公布，而且未来如何规范个人对外投资不动产之门槛也值得期待。

然而面对投资境外房地产的种种困惑和风险如何应对，这是有意投资海外房地产的投资人应该认真考虑的问题。尽管境外房地产看似便宜，但其税收、维护成本等却可能十分高昂，而且很多境外的房地产买后能否容易出租取得较好的收益也不无疑问。

那么作为一种投资，如何选择房地产就颇有学问了。

在此前，很多境外的房地产开发商或中介人员经常联系本人要求合作推销房地产。但由于政策限制，本人对之一直较为冷淡。随着政策的放开，随着中国人走出去的步伐加快，视野拓宽，可以预见会带来一股不小的投资海外房地产的热潮。

笔者正陆续在研究美国、加拿大和澳大路亚等国的房地产交易流程和风险所在，希望能够帮助到出海买房的国人。