Speaker: Bruce Pang, Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) Greater China

For the past three decades, the real estate sector has been a cornerstone of China’s economic growth, social development, and urbanization. Commercial real estate, in particular, has thrived due to vigorous domestic growth and seamless integration into the global marketplace, resulting in a mature, diverse, and thriving sector. As China pledges to shift its long-accustomed investment-driven growth model to a “quality over quantity” paradigm, the property market is undergoing significant transformations, with slower growth and disparities among sub-sectors.

This lecture will explore these transformative dynamics and offer a forward-looking perspective on China’s real estate market, including both the residential property sphere and key segments within the commercial property sector. By utilizing official data and JLL’s proprietary data, we find that China’s property market serves as a proxy that can effectively reflect the country’s short-term cyclical headwinds and longer-term mega-trends. This includes China’s reshaped landscape in investment, consumption, financial, and services sectors, its urbanization and demographic outlook, among others. We conclude that time and patience are still needed for China’s emerging industries and domestic consumption to regain growth momentum and offset the pressure on economic expansion, especially as policymakers demonstrate a higher tolerance for slower growth and more focus on the domestic market.

Bruce Pang is the Chief Economist and Head of Research at Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) Greater China. He also is a member of the Chief Economist Forum in China, a Distinguished Senior Research Fellow at the National Institution for Finance and Development (NIFD), and a Research Fellow at the Center for Housing and Urban Development of Shanghai Jiao Tong University. In addition, he holds adjunct faculty positions at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Fudan University, Renmin University of China, Sun Yat-sen University, among others. Bruce holds a PhD degree in Economics from the University of Hong Kong as well as an MA from the University of Chicago and an MSc from HKUST. He has authored papers in peer-reviewed academic journals and industry journals, focusing on macroeconomics, policy analysis, real estate economics, financial markets, and asset allocation strategies.

We would like to thank the MIT Sustainable Urbanization Lab, the University of British Columbia’s School of Community and Regional Planning, and the Harvard Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies for supporting this event. Please subscribe to our mailing list if you’d like to receive e-mail notifications: http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/urbanchinaseminar.

Join Zoom Meeting: https://mit.zoom.us/j/97147498753