Chances of Owning Hong Kong Property For City's 'Sandwich Class' Likened to 'Winning the Lottery'

Housing remains to be one of Hong Kong's major issues, as more and more people lose hope in owning a home, South China Morning Post reports.

Jesse Chan Hiu-tung, a 28-year-old engineer, together with his wife and son, decided to move in with his parents after one year of living in their own flat. Hiu-tiung belongs to the so-called "sandwich class"; those whose income are over the public rental flats threshold, but are unable to afford buying a flat.

"Of course, ideally, we'd like to live on our own, but the reality is that rent and housing prices in Hong Kong are just too expensive," said Chan.

"I can't really plan or expect when we can move out again, my only thought now is to save as much as we can," adding the mere amount they get to save out of his HK$40,000 income after paying rent, food and taking care of his retired parents and two-year old son.

"Who knows? It might be 10 or 15 years before we'll be able to buy a flat."

Chan is looking forward to the upcoming policy address in the hopes that schemes for more discounted flats will be introduced but he is not being highly optimistic.

"It'd be like trying to win the lottery," said Chan. "The government can only provide a few hundred or thousand flats for each batch, but the demand for it is far greater."

For the past 12 years, Hong Kong's property prices had a whopping 360 per cent inflation from 2003. A HK$2-million 600-square-foot flat in Tai Koo in 2003 now sells for at least HK$8 million.

Leung Chun-ying's government has since been making efforts to address the rising housing prices, including the imposition of a 15% stamp duty tax to non-local buyers and companies, and an across-the-board "special stamp duty" for sellers.

These measures, after two years, however proved ineffective in cooling the market as seen by Leung himself, which led him to pledge for increasing the land supply to ease off demand.

From the previous projection of 480,000, Hong Kong's Transport and Housing decreased its flat supply target to 460,000 for the coming ten years due to a lower than expected household projection.

Amidst economic uncertainties at home and overseas, analysts are predicting a plunge in home prices for 2016 until 2017, and this may be good news for Chan and the rest of prospective homeowners.

"There'll come a day when I'll have saved enough for the down payment for our first flat, but for now, it's still a distant dream," said Chan.