Chapter 11
Housing
The Government's policy objectives on housing are to assist grassroots families secure public housing to meet their basic housing needs; assist the public to choose accommodation according to their personal circumstances and what they can afford, and encourage those able to be homeowners; provide subsidised home ownership flats in addition to public rental housing to build a progressive housing ladder; and maintain the healthy and steady development of the private property market, with priority to be given to Hong Kong permanent residents' needs.
There were about 2,613,500 flats in Hong Kong as at December 2012, comprising about 766,300 public rental housing (PRH) flats', 390,600 subsidised sale flats and 1,456,600 private sector flats. About 30 per cent of Hong Kong's population live in public rental housing flats, and another 17 per cent live in subsidised sale flats.
Housing Policy
The Government aims to provide - mainly through the Hong Kong Housing Authority (HKHA)2 public rental housing to those with low incomes who cannot afford private rental accommodation and to keep the average waiting time for public rental housing at around three years for general applicants. The HKHA has a rolling public housing construction programme. It plans to build about 75,000 rental flats over the five years from 2012-13 and about 17,000 Home Ownership Scheme flats over the four years starting from 2016-17.
The Government's policy is to maintain the healthy and stable development of the private property market. The Government estimates that in 2012-13, housing land supply from different sources could provide about 20,000 private residential flats, and that about 67,000 first-hand units should come on the market in the next three to four years.
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Including public rental housing and interim housing flats run by the Hong Kong Housing Authority and rental flats run by the Hong Kong Housing Society.
The HKHA, established in 1973, is a statutory body responsible for implementing the majority of Hong Kong's public housing programmes. The HKHA provides public rental housing to low income families who cannot afford private rental accommodation. It also runs interim housing and transit centres to provide temporary accommodation to families facing short-term problems in finding suitable accommodation.
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