I asked my agent the other day and he said they are holding steady, not going up and not really falling either. At least in the CBD area. This will change early next year as the CCTV complex comes close to opening, there will be over 10,000 people working there and many are good jobs, so the areas apartments will be quickly filled which means higher rents.

Even if that is true, I suspect it is a drop in the bucket compared to the extreme oversupply of new housing in the market now. I'm not an expert and not a realtor, but I was able to beat up my landlord pretty effectively and get a substantial discount when I moved recently. And several of my friends who have gotten new apartments or renegotiated their rents in the last 2-3 months have been able to do the same.

I had a realtor show me about 15 different places. I liked 3 or 4 of them. I told her to offer 60% of the asking price for each one. She thought I was an a-hole, but did it anyway. 6 months ago, they all probably would have told me to ferk off. Every single one of them called us back to negotiate rather than risk leaving their apartment vacant. We ended up with a place for about 35% less than the asking price and got a number of concessions for new furniture, lighting fixtures changed, etc. In my book, that is a market that's deflating.

Cheers,

i gotta try that with my office landlord.

I hope he doesn't read this board

V, you know why they gave you 35% off?
because those landlords' original prices were 35% higher than the REAL rents!!
it's called "wool are from sheeps' body"

we chinese are cunning, this is a lesson for ya!

well how do you pressure these guys? Ive been looking at 1 bedroom places in season park and like the place alot but feel that 6000 per month is just ridiculous, since ive seen about 10 ads here for the same type apartment (the all look exactly the same, same furniture and so on).
I have 7 realtors numbers, can anyone advise me how to put the squeeze on? I probably would be happy with getting it for 5000 which is still too high but my current short term lease runs out 1. november

help much appreciated could even be rewarded with rounds of beer if that works as an incentiviser

I think you should follow V's approach - go look at a bunch of places and for the ones you like, offer a bit less than what you feel it's worth. If market conditions are in your favour, you should be able to find a good deal. If you lowball, do so respectfully so they don't lose face - of course if you're going through an agent, they should take care of this for you.

It also helps to know what you want and be ready to sign when you find a good deal, rather than having to "think it over" for a while and when you're finally ready to sign find out that it's taken. But I'd get a move on now as you still have 2 weeks left to find a place.

Beer is always appreciated.

my contract is up and my rent is going UP this year. it was super low last year, so now i guess it is just raising to market price...but im scared to take it because i'm also not sure if rent will fall over the next year and i'll end up in a bad deal..

The asking prices were all in the 8k-12k range. However, one of my friends was looking at places in the 3500-6000 range and experienced the same phenomenon.

Cheers,

We have colleaagues in the R/E industry and generally it seems domestic rental is static, maybe a slight increase is in the offing in CBD and highly sought after places, esp those that cater to the "Foreigner" market.
This end is pretty much driven by you guys who are so paranoaid about where you live that you will pay whatever the landlord asks, and as Bobby Liu said, the guy can drop 30 or 40% and still make a killing.
The other factor it seems is the fall off in actual sales, new home sales have declined, more people are renting, so the rent is currently stable and a good business.
Perhaps next year if new houses prices fall or owning becomes more attractive the rental market may reflect this.
Having said [or reported] all that, we live in a 2 bedroom loft, not too far from Dawanglu, have paid 3K for the last 2 years but negotiated a rise with the Squire last month, he wanted an extra 500, we met near the middle at 300.
Bottom line, my opinion, is this is China and everything is negotiable, problem is in the Lawai market too many of us are either on company paid rents and don't give a damn how high the rent is or dont't shop around and just compare it with what we would pay back home in US dollars or whatever and think we are getting a bargain.

I think that although you are probably right i have a bad feeling that Chinese property owners are like the Chinese scalpers during the olympics, completely and utterly unflexible and willing to stick it out hoping to bag the stupid laowai who either has a company paying or doesnt know any better.
But I hope we will see the fall pretty soon as the prices here are almost the same as i paid in Brussels which just cant be right

I just visited a studio in Seasons park RMB3700 per mon
I decide to look for flat mate to share my RMB5400 mon

???

i would assume most people working for cctv have a governement s employee salary ... not enough to buy a condo in the cbd, not everybody at cctv is li yong or choosing the starlets for the new year s programme ...

being organized people with an iron bowl mentality (government, right?), i bet they re already landlords

like all chinese administrations, didn t cctv provide apartments for their employees? at least till recently

because being a lifetime employee of the chinese government (or for any government in that matter), even for paltry wages, gives to your banker a lifetime guarantee your (reasonable) mortgage will be repaid

not the 10 000 of them, and these ones already live in xiangshan, chaoyang or shunyi, believe me

on a general basis, i bet good deal of beijing landlords are pretty recent ones which means they still have some mortgage to repay, applies for cctv landlords

i don t see them moving out at a loss to be "closer" from work, ppl here are used to long commutes and would always put their financial interest first even at the expense of their time

as for the new cctv employees, most of them are now employed by satellite companies (and no longer enjoying the iron bowl), they ve to rent, and they will go to tongzhou or somewhere along the batong line or will extend their commute

Good point!

Well, you might end up paying a little more. However, by the time March of '09 rolls around, the freefall of the Beijing real estate market should be in full swing. You'll be able to negotiate a better deal then.

Cheers,