Two China cities tighten housing purchase

BEIJING - Two major cities in central China have further tightened housing purchase restrictions in the latest bid to rein in rising house prices.

The municipal government of Zhengzhou, capital of Henan province, announced Wednesday night that residents without local hukou (household registration) need to pay at least two years' income tax or social security contributions before they can buy a house.

Meanwhile, authorities in Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, announced the expansion of house purchase limits to parts of three suburban districts.

Residents with Wuhan hukou need to pay a 50 percent downpayment when buying a second home and will be banned from buying a third home. Those without local hukou need a two-year record of income tax or social security payments before buying a house, and cannot buy a second property.

Over the past several months, more than a dozen cities in China have rolled out measures to cool a red-hot property market.

At the Central Economic Work Conference last week, Chinese policymakers highlighted the curbing of asset bubbles in next year's economic work.

The meeting called for measures to build a market-oriented and long-term mechanism to curtail the property bubble and prevent instability in the market.