15 Renting and buying a home

Administrative regulations state clearly: “Where the lessor collects a deposit, the amount, time of return, and circumstances in which the deposit may be deducted shall be stipulated in the housing lease contract. Except as provided in the contract, the lessor shall not deduct the deposit without proper cause.” Three things must appear in the contract: how much is collected, when it is returned, and when deduction is allowed. Grounds not in the contract cannot be used to take your money.

Administrative regulations make it clear: “Landlords must not use violence, threats, or any other illegal means to compel tenants to end their housing lease or vacate the rental property.” Eviction means being forced to move out. In such situations, call the police first to secure evidence — never confront the landlord yourself.

Administrative rules explicitly forbid real estate agencies from collecting or paying rent and deposits on behalf of landlords. This means agents have no legal authority to handle such payments. Every time the money passes through the agent, there is one more chance for them to take it and disappear.

Regulations require any housing rental business that sublets units to set up a dedicated escrow account for rental funds and make it publicly available. Subletting means a company rents entire properties from landlords and then re-rents them to tenants. The tiny discount from upfront annual payments simply does not outweigh the risk of losing both your deposit and all future rent payments if the company folds. For those who also take out rent loans, the risk is even greater.

The Civil Code has a rule called “sale does not break lease” (买卖不破租赁). The statute reads: a change of ownership of the leased thing during the lease term does not affect the lease contract’s validity. If the owner changes during the term, the signed lease still holds; the new landlord must honor the original contract through expiry.

Before you sign, the landlord must show you identity papers and the real-estate title certificate. If there is no title certificate, the landlord must produce other material that shows a right to let the home. The landlord must also cooperate while you inquire into and check the information on this home. That is a duty the administrative regulations put on the lessor. Before any contract is signed, take your identity card to the real-estate registration office of the city or county where the home is, and you can check several things. What you can see is: the basic facts of the home, whether there are co-owners, whether a mortgage or a right of residence is registered, and whether the home has been sealed. After the contract is signed, the lease lets you check the registration result. This step matters because "a sale does not break a lease" has two exceptions. If the home was mortgaged to a bank before it was let, and is later auctioned to pay the debt, you cannot require the new owner to let you stay on under the old contract. The same is true if the home had already been sealed by a court before it was let. When the court auctions, if the lease gets in the way of a mortgage that came first, the court removes the lease and then auctions. The other way around, if the home was let to you first and you had already moved in, and the landlord mortgaged it only later, the mortgage does not affect your lease. If the home is sealed, or the title is in dispute, so that you cannot live there, you can end the contract. If someone else asserts a right and you cannot stay, you can demand to pay less rent or none. Sending all the money by transfer, noted as "rent for such-and-such a home for such-and-such a month," is the author's experience: if there is a dispute, it can show that you paid, and what you paid for.

The regulation is plain: where the parties agree that a real-estate brokerage will collect and pay the transaction funds, the funds shall be transferred through the dedicated client transaction-settlement deposit account that the brokerage has opened at a bank. The purchase price goes into a supervised dedicated account, not the agency’s own account, and not some broker’s private account.

The rules state clearly that the minimum rental unit is the originally designed room; one room must not be partitioned into several units rented separately. Per-person living floor area must not fall below the local minimum. Kitchens, bathrooms, balconies, and basement storage must not be rented for people to live in. During the lease the lessor may not unilaterally raise rent at will. For violations of Article 8, the competent authority shall order the lessor to correct within a time limit; if the lessor fails to correct on time, a fine of 5000 yuan to 30,000 yuan may be imposed.

A State Council General Office document states clearly: “Urban residents must not purchase rural homestead land, farmer housing, or ‘small-property-rights houses.’” The same document also provides that after a farmer sells or leases out housing, a further application for homestead land will not be approved. A 2019 document from the Central Rural Work Leading Group Office and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs repeats it: “It is strictly forbidden for urban residents to purchase rural homestead land.” The same document gives the lawful path: urban residents may rent rural houses for residence or business. The lease term must not exceed 20 years; when it ends the parties may agree again.

An off-plan home is called a commercial-housing pre-sale in the regulations — the developer selling you a home that is still being built. In August 2026 the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, the Ministry of Natural Resources, and the National Financial Regulatory Administration issued a document: “The down payment, the personal housing loan, and other purchase funds paid by the buyer shall all be deposited into the funds supervision account.” Supervision is lifted only after the home has passed completion inspection and water, electricity, gas, and heat are ready for handover. The developer must write into the purchase contract the rights and duties of depositing the purchase funds into the supervision account. If the developer is in breach and cannot hand the home over on time, you may end the contract as the contract provides. The developer must return the money as the contract says and bear liability for the breach. The People’s Bank of China and the National Financial Regulatory Administration at the same time provided that a personal housing loan for a pre-sale home is paid by the bank directly into the project’s pre-sale funds supervision account. A 2022 document from three departments already stated that earnest money, the down payment, and the mortgage loan “shall all be deposited directly into the supervision account.” A project that has not received a pre-sale permit must not be pre-sold, and the developer must not take earnest money by subscription, reservation, queue numbers, or VIP cards. A pre-sale contract signed without a pre-sale permit is held invalid by the court. If the permit is obtained before the suit is filed, it may be held valid. Money paid somewhere other than the supervision account is outside this supervision. The same 2026 document also provides that for a project sold as a finished home, after the construction permit is obtained the developer may first take a “small amount of earnest money.” That earnest money is supervised by the housing-funds supervision body, held in an “earnest-money supervision account” opened at the project’s lead bank, and supervision is lifted only when the home is ready for handover.

The Supreme People's Court's judicial interpretation states: if a developer takes earnest money through a subscription, an order, or a reservation, and no formal sale contract is signed because of one side's cause, the earnest-money rules apply. The earnest-money rules are: if the side that paid breaks the deal, the earnest money is not returned; if the side that received it breaks the deal, it is returned double. See Section 12, item 15 (write “earnest money” when you take money). If no contract is signed for a cause that cannot be laid on either side, "the seller shall return the earnest money to the buyer." Another article covers the loan. If the sale contract agrees payment by loan, and no loan contract is signed because of one side's cause, so that the sale contract cannot be performed, the other side can end the contract and demand compensation. If no loan contract is signed for a cause that cannot be laid on either side, either side can end the contract. The developer must return the principal and interest of the purchase money it received, or return the earnest money. The articles only state the principle of what counts as a cause that cannot be laid on either side. The examples below are the author's. Policy on housing loans tightening locally after you sign, or the bank stopping lending, is generally a cause that cannot be laid on either side. Overdue entries on your own credit report, or income records that are not enough, count as your cause. Incomplete papers on the project, so that the bank will not lend on it, counts as the developer's cause. These two articles cover only commercial housing bought from a developer. They do not apply to buying a second-hand home.

The ministry regulation states that where the price is by area, the contract must say how an area difference is handled. If the contract does not say, the following applies. "Where the absolute value of the area-difference ratio is within 3% (including 3%), the price is settled on the actual area." Over 3%, you have the right to return the home. If you return it, the developer must, within 30 days of the day you ask, return the price already paid, and pay interest at the same time. If you do not return it and the registered area is larger than the contract, you pay for the part within 3%, the developer bears the part over 3%, and the property right is yours. If the registered area is smaller than the contract, the developer returns the part within 3%, and returns double the part over 3%. On advertisements, the Supreme People's Court's judicial interpretation states: sales advertisements and promotional material are generally only an invitation to negotiate. They are not a contract. But a statement by the developer about homes and supporting facilities inside the scope of the development plan, if it is specific and definite, and if it has a major effect on whether you sign and on the price, counts as contract content. "That statement and promise, even if not written into the commercial-housing sale contract, shall still be contract content," and breaking it means liability for breach.

The Supreme People's Court's judicial interpretation states: if the developer is late handing the home over, and still has not handed it over within 3 months after you demand it, you can end the contract, unless the contract agrees otherwise. The right to end the contract has a time limit. If the developer demands that you say what you will do, you must decide within 3 months. If the developer does not demand that, you must use the right within one year of the day you knew you could end the contract. After that it is gone. If the contract agrees neither a penalty nor how compensation is calculated, late handover is counted as the rent, over the period of the delay, of a similar home in the same area. If, because of the developer, you still have no title deed by one of the following deadlines, the developer bears liability for breach. There are three deadlines: the deed deadline agreed in the contract; for an off-plan home, 90 days from the day of handover; for a finished home, 90 days from the day the contract was signed. If the contract agrees no penalty, it is calculated on the total purchase money you have paid, by reference to the standard for overdue-loan interest set by the People's Bank of China. If, more than one year after the deed deadline, registration still cannot be done because of the developer, you can end the contract and demand compensation. If the agreed penalty is too high and the developer asks for it to be reduced, the court adjusts it on the standard of exceeding the actual loss by 30%.

The Civil Code states: once a purchase agreement is signed, to secure getting the home later, you may apply to the registration office for an advance-notice registration as agreed. "After the advance-notice registration, a disposal of the real estate without the consent of the right-holder under that registration does not take effect in property law." The advance-notice registration has a time limit. It lapses if the contract is ended, or in similar situations, or if no application for formal registration is made within 90 days of the day formal registration became possible. The implementing rules of the Ministry of Natural Resources put that onto the registration office: both pre-sale commercial housing and the sale of a second-hand home can be filed. While the advance-notice registration is in effect, if the seller applies to register this home without your written consent, the registration office will not handle it. If you are buying an off-plan home and the developer does not apply together with you as agreed, you can apply alone. What you can check before signing: if you intend to buy, your identity card alone lets you check whether this home has a mortgage, an advance-notice registration, or an objection registration, and whether it has been sealed. An online filing of the contract does not control whether the contract is effective. The Supreme People's Court's judicial interpretation states that a pre-sale contract that was not filed does not, for that reason, fail to be valid, unless the two sides agreed that it takes effect only once filed.

A 2024 announcement of the People’s Bank of China allows the borrower and the lender to negotiate a change in the points added to, or taken off, the LPR in the mortgage rate. The LPR is the loan prime rate; a mortgage rate is that rate plus or minus points. In a press briefing, the responsible person at the People’s Bank of China said that the points written in the old contract were fixed for the whole term of the loan, and that this change alters that. In August 2026 the People’s Bank of China and the National Financial Regulatory Administration wrote into a document: for floating-rate mortgages already issued, when the rate has diverged by a certain margin from the rate on newly issued mortgages nationwide, “the borrower may negotiate with the banking institution to change the interest rate agreed in the contract, or apply for a newly issued floating-rate personal housing loan to replace the existing loan. The method shall be chosen by the borrower.” The new loan must not be larger than the principal left on the old loan. How much you can save, worked by the equal-payment formula as an example: a loan of 1,000,000 yuan over 30 years, at an annual rate of 4.0%, has a monthly payment of about 4774 yuan, and at 3.5% about 4490 yuan. That is about 284 yuan less a month, and about 100,000 yuan less interest over 30 years.

On 7 May 2025 the People’s Bank of China issued a document lowering housing provident fund loan rates, effective from 8 May. For a first-home fund loan of more than 5 years the rate is 2.6%; for 5 years or less it is 2.1%. For a second home, more than 5 years is not below 3.075%, and 5 years or less is not below 2.525%. As of October 2026 this was still the latest adjustment. Commercial mortgage rates are set as LPR plus or minus points; the LPR is the loan prime rate. On 20 September 2026 the LPR for terms of 5 years or more was 3.5%. The People’s Bank of China’s monetary policy report for the second quarter of 2026 states that in June “the rate on newly issued personal housing loans was about 3.1%.” How much you can save, worked by the equal-payment formula as an example: a loan of 1,000,000 yuan over 30 years, at 2.6%, has a monthly payment of about 4003 yuan, and at 3.1% about 4270 yuan. That is about 267 yuan less a month, and about 96,000 yuan less interest over 30 years. Even if the fund ceiling covers only 600,000 yuan and the other 400,000 yuan goes commercial, it still beats putting the whole amount on a commercial loan: about 160 yuan less a month, and about 58,000 yuan less interest over 30 years. The second-home fund rate floor of 3.075% is close to the commercial 3.1%, so little is saved.

Article 944 of the Civil Code has three layers. The first is: “A property service provider must not collect property fees by cutting off electricity, water, heat, or gas.” The second: if the manager provided services as agreed, an owner must not refuse to pay on the ground of “not having accepted or not needing to accept” the services. The third: if an owner is overdue, the manager may demand payment within a reasonable period; if still unpaid when that period ends, the manager may sue or apply for arbitration. The Property Management Regulations also state that when an owner is overdue on property fees, the owners’ committee shall urge payment within a time limit; if still unpaid, the property service enterprise may sue. Complaints go to the real-estate administration of the people’s government at or above the county level; the regulations require them to handle owners’ complaints promptly. A Supreme People’s Court judicial interpretation states that if the manager unilaterally expands the fee scope, raises the fee standard, or charges twice, you may raise that as a defense against payment. Unauthorized fees already paid may be demanded back.

Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development rules state that when selling commercial housing, the developer must provide the buyer with a Residential Quality Warranty and Residential Use Instructions. The developer bears quality warranty liability for homes it sells; the warranty period runs from the day of handover. The commercial-housing warranty must not be shorter than what remains under the quality warranty the contractor gave the developer. For quality problems within the warranty scope during the period, the developer must repair and also compensate for losses caused. Damage from force majeure or improper use is not the developer’s responsibility. The contractor’s minimum warranty periods are set by a State Council regulation, counted from the day of passing completion acceptance. Roof waterproofing, and seepage prevention for bathrooms, rooms, and exterior walls that require waterproofing, is 5 years. Heating and cooling systems are 2 heating seasons and cooling seasons. Electrical lines, water-supply and drainage pipes, equipment installation, and fit-out works are 2 years. Foundations and the main structure last for the reasonable service life stated in the design documents. A Supreme People’s Court judicial interpretation states that during the warranty period the developer bears the duty to repair. “If the seller refuses to repair or delays repair beyond a reasonable period, the buyer may repair personally or through others. The repair cost and other losses caused during the repair period are borne by the seller.” If a quality problem seriously affects normal residence and use, you may end the contract and demand compensation. If the main structure fails inspection as unqualified, you may also end the contract and demand compensation. Checking room by room on handover day, writing problems into the handover record, and photographing them is the author’s experience. Improper use is outside the warranty, so problems noted at handover are hard for the developer to blame on your later renovation.