China Restricts New Land Supply for Commercial Property to Tackle Glut
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Residential property developments in Yangzhou, Jiangsu province. Photo: VCG
China has moved to tighten control over the supply of new construction land for commercial real estate, marking a significant step to address a supply glut that has weighed on the property market for more than four years.
Under a new notice jointly issued by the Ministry of Natural Resources and other government agencies, newly allocated construction land will be prioritized for major projects and public-welfare developments and, “in principle,” will not be used for commercial property projects.
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- China tightened controls on new commercial real estate land, prioritizing major and public-welfare projects to address a multi-year supply glut.
- New land quotas are now linked to progress in revitalizing existing stock, with annual approvals capped by the amount of revitalized land.
- Despite policy shifts, weak property sales and cautious developers mean reduced new land supply is unlikely to raise land prices short-term.
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Who’s Who
- China Real Estate Information Corp.
- China Real Estate Information Corp. (CRIC) is a research center providing data and analysis on the Chinese property market. Its research head, Xie Yangchun, offered insights on new land policies, stating they're not a suspension of real estate land supply. CRIC data indicates rising undeveloped land inventory in major cities, partly due to state-owned enterprises delaying construction.
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What Happened When
- April 2024：
- Politburo meeting gave momentum to the push to clear property inventory.
- 2025：
- State-owned enterprises acquired prime land to stabilize the market.
- By the end of February 2026：
- Only about 335 billion yuan (43%) of the over 770 billion yuan in planned special bonds for idle land had been issued.
- Early 2026：
- Total stock residential land in 97 sample cities fell 2% year on year to 563 million square meters; undeveloped land rose 9% to 160 million square meters.
- March 11, 2026：
- A China Index Academy report analyzed the impact of the new construction land policy.
- 2026：
- China issued a notice to tighten control over new construction land for commercial real estate.
- 2026：
- Annual new urban and rural construction land approved must not exceed the area of revitalized stock land for that year and subsequent years.
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