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The essence of good housing management lies in the relationship between landlord and tenant. In their management duties the Authority's housing assistants make regular monthly visits to collect rents, and during such visits the state of the flats is inspected and any irregularities in tenancy or in occupation are quickly discovered and dealt with. The Management staff is carefully selected from candidates who have a good education and are considered to be temperamentally suited for these tasks. Housing Assistants are trained for their duties within the department and they are encouraged to sit for examinations of a professional standard, either with established institutions or the Hong Kong Government Housing Management Examination. In this way they obtain recognized qualifications so that in due course the Authority will have a complete staff of well-trained housing managers and assistants. It takes only a few years to design and build a housing estate, but the schemes which are thus constructed will require to be managed for the full extent of their life, which may well be anything up to 100 years.
Rents
Rents for all estates have been fixed by first calculating the direct annual expenditure and operating costs of each estate, including charges for amortization of the capital cost over 40 years at 5 per cent interest per annum, with the addition of a small budgeted surplus to add an element of self-finance for future schemes and as a buffer against inflation. A standard rental per flat is then calculated on a square foot unit, and adjusted in detail depending on relative quality, location and amenity.
For the year ending 31st March 1969 the gross rental income from completed accommodation was over $41.77m. and of this sum only $560 was written off as not recoverable. The rent collection in both Housing Authority and Government Low Cost Housing estates combined now averages around $4.00m. each month and there are regularly no arrears state of affairs which has become accepted as normal.
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The Authority's properties are rated in the usual way and the rates are paid by the tenants as part of the inclusive monthly rental charge. Water and electricity is metered separately to each flat, and paid for direct by the tenant.
Rental Policy. The Authority has recently adopted a policy of increasing the rents on those of its estates which are more than four years old, at no more frequent intervals than two years and with no greater increase at any one time than 10%, with about six months' notice being given to the tenants concerned. This policy takes account of increasing development and operation costs and provides a modest amount for reserves which can be invested in further projects.
Applications
The present rules of eligibility for applying for accommodation on the Authority's Estates are that applicants must be 21 years of age or over, the family must consist of not less than four persons, the family income must generally be between $400 and $900 per month, but families with incomes of up to $1,250 can be considered for vacancies among higher rental flats, and the applicant must have been resident in the Colony for at least five years.
These rules in more detail and with other information for applicants are freely available in English and Chinese on leaflets obtainable, on request, from the offices of the Public Enquiry Service, the City District Officers, the Urban Council Ward Offices, the Authority's estates and elsewhere in the Colony. These rules will be combined with those for Government Low Cost Housing into a comprehensive waiting list, with effect from 1st April 1969 to select tenants to fill future Housing Authority and Government Low-cost Housing estates as well as casual vacancies on existing estates.
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