Hong Kong developer Wheelock Properties has contributed a portion of its large property assets to help ease the city's housing crisis. The company is the third major developer in Hong Kong to voluntarily donate land to the government to help it address the current housing issue.
Wheelock properties announced that it will be loaning three plots of land, with a land area accounting for less than a tenth of its total land assets, to the Hong Kong Council of Social Service and the Lok Sin Tong Charity. The loan of the plots of the land, which has a total area of roughly 500,000 square feet, will be loaned to the government agency and the charity for a period of eight years.
The three plots of land were loaned for a token sum of just HK$1 each. The developer wants the lands to be used by the agency and the charity to put up transitional homes for families that are on the waiting list for affordable public housing. The three lots are expected to generate around 2,000 homes for more than 20,000 people that are currently on the waiting list.
Wheelock Properties chairman, Stewart Leung, mentioned in a statement that the housing shortage in Hong Kong has become a serious issue that should immediately be addressed. The government has so far vowed to provide up to 10,000 units over the next three years. Leung felt that it was his company's responsibility to do their part in alleviating the increased pressures.
Leung clarified that his company's gesture has nothing to do with politics or redeeming itself to its critics. Instead, the gesture is simply a response to the city's dire need and providing an eight-year lease for transitional housing projects will go a long way in allowing the government enough time to implement its housing policies and planned projects.
Apart from the three plots of land, Leung stated that it currently has around 5 million square feet of farmland, which it intends to use as it joins the city's Land Sharing Pilot Scheme. Leung stated that it plans to contribute another two or three parcels of land to the project, which it stated was part of its duty as a corporate citizen of Hong Kong.
The first two major developers to step up and donate portions of their properties to ease the city's housing crisis were Henderson Land Development and New World Development. Both companies have pledged to lease a combined 3.43 million square feet of land, to be used to develop public housing projects for poor families.
