Plans to cool housing sector

Guangdong to enforce the new 20% income tax on home sellers' gains

The Guangdong provincial government has unveiled rules to curb rising housing prices, and promised to strictly enforce the country's new 20 percent income tax on home sellers' capital gains.

Early this year, the State Council, or China's cabinet, announced that property owners who sell their homes will have to pay an income tax equivalent to 20 percent of the profit they make on the transaction. The income tax for such sales is currently 1 to 2 percent of the sale price. The new measure is intended to cool the property market.