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The following is issued on behalf of the Hong Kong Housing Authority:
The Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA)'s Subsidised Housing Committee (SHC) today (May 6) endorsed the implementation details of the Green Form Subsidised Home Ownership Pilot Scheme (GSH).
The implementation details follow those of the Home Ownership Scheme (HOS) as far as possible as they are considered to be effective, widely accepted and easy to understand.
"Using the same sets of rules, where appropriate, can maintain policy consistency across different types of subsidised sale flats under the HA," a spokesman for HA said. The GSH will adopt the same arrangements as the HOS in offering a mortgage guarantee and in calculation of premium payment.
On eligibility, the GSH will adopt the same definition for Green Form applicants as for those under the HOS. Tenants allocated public rental housing (PRH) units via the Express Flat Allocation Scheme will not be eligible for the GSH within three years from the commencement of their PRH tenancies.
The price setting mechanism for the GSH will take into account the following principles: (a) the discount for GSH flats will be higher than for HOS flats; (b) affordability of target applicants, i.e. at least 50 per cent of the flats will be affordable to target applicants, assuming a mortgage-to-income ratio of 40 per cent benchmarked to the household income at the eligibility limit for applying PRH for a four-person household; and (c) the selling price should in general not be lower than the cost.
"Since we do not have the selected site yet, we cannot work out the exact cost of a GSH development and hence the discount which we can offer at this juncture. The pricing and the sales arrangements for GSH flats will be decided about two months prior to the pre-sale exercise," the spokesman said.
The site selection principles for the GSH as endorsed by the SHC include: the site should not contain public facilities that will incur very high management or maintenance fees; the conversion of a PRH site to GSH development should not result in substantive changes to the original planning; and preferably be a standalone site, or a site which can be easily carved out from a PRH development.
"The HA will proceed to identify suitable sites for the GSH. The timing for pre-sale of GSH flats depends on the time needed to resolve site-specific issues of the selected site, as well as the time needed to conduct district consultation, prepare the land lease, the Deed of Mutual Covenant and other sale-related documents. We also need to take into account the timing for other sale exercises under the HA. Therefore, it may take a bit of time before the sale of GSH flats can be launched upon selection of the site," the spokesman said.
In respect of resale restrictions, the SHC decided that the HA will not buy back GSH flats. However, if a GSH flat owner offers to sell his flat to the HA during the first five years of the first assignment from the HA, the HA will exercise the power under the Housing Ordinance to nominate Green Form buyers. According to the Housing Ordinance, the price will be set at the original price of the GSH flat sold by the HA within two years from the first assignment; and the prevailing market price of the GSH flat assessed by the Director of Housing less the original discount between the third and fifth year from the first assignment.
"Like the current practice of the HOS Secondary Market, GSH flat owners will be allowed to identify eligible Green Form buyers through their own means for nomination by HA, including through estate agents," the spokesman said.
Ends/Wednesday, May 6, 2015
Issued at HKT 19:30
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