ENG-2013 — Page 225

Chapter 11

Housing

The government's policy objectives on housing are to assist grassroots families to 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; provide subsidised home ownership flats 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 2,639,000 flats in Hong Kong as at December 2013, comprising about 780,300 public rental units', 392,800 subsidised sale flats and 1,465,900 private sector flats. About 29 per cent of Hong Kong's population live in public rental units, 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 (PRH) to those with low incomes who cannot afford private rental accommodation and to keep the average waiting time for PRH at around three years for general applicants. The HKHA has a rolling public housing construction programme. According to the latest programme released in December 2013, about 82,000 PRH flats will be built over the five years from 2013-14 and about 17,000 Home Ownership Scheme (HOS) flats will be built over the four years starting from 2016-17. To increase the supply of PRH, the Chief Executive announced in his 2013 Policy Address a production target of at least 100,000 PRH units in total over the five years starting from 2018.

The government's policy is to maintain the healthy and stable development of the private property market. As at end December, the government estimates that about 71,000 units will be provided in the primary residential property market in the coming three to four years.

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Including public rental housing and interim housing flats under the Hong Kong Housing Authority and rental flats under the Hong Kong Housing Society.

The HKHA is a statutory body responsible for implementing the majority of Hong Kong's public housing programmes. The HKHA provides PRH to low income families who cannot afford private rental accommodation and Home Ownership Scheme flats to low to middle-income families. 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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