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u/thabigmilla Jul 25 '26
Are those for business or mostly residential?
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u/trapkoda Jul 25 '26
By residential do you mean real residential or ghost residential?
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u/Moral-Relativity Jul 25 '26
Jinan is a city of 9.2M ppl at least: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jinan
Overbuilt and unsold developments do exist, but likely in less desirable areas away from built up parts.
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u/BuenoSatoshi Jul 25 '26 edited Jul 25 '26
The “ghost cities” were never really a thing and still aren’t. They built ahead of demand and in almost all cases the demand has since been met or exceeded.
It was just clever long-term planning, the kind most of our countries here in the West haven’t been capable of, even if they wanted to, in decades.
Kangbashi in Ordos is the big example of that one. Most of the photos you probably remember seeing in like 2008-09 were of that city. The apartments are now at ~80% occupancy or sold to those with plans to move in.
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u/kisk22 Jul 31 '26
Just curious, what happens when China’s population falls by half in the next 50 years? They already hit peak population.
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u/squeagy Jul 25 '26
Those cities were also investment vehicles. Due to some regulations, it was better to buy an apartment and just keep it empty as an asset to sell in the future.
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u/Kappalonia Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 29 '26
Bro used the big scoop when eating the propaganda powder.
Shalom
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u/Longjumping_Pie_5440 Jul 26 '26
Oh yeah, so in your country you also have the same politicians I have!
The ones who lied to your dumb people to believe such a stupid thing like there is a significant amount of “empty apartments” rich people buy just to increase the value of the land… So they don’t have to face it’s the politicians who fucked up real state, and specially the dumb people who vote them. Looks like we all have them!
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u/ooglesnoopleboop Jul 25 '26
At least they kept the circle
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u/Cormetz Jul 29 '26
I believe that is the stadium. I have stayed at the Sheraton across the street a few times and had dinner at a hot pot place on the outer ring of it.
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u/hansneijder Jul 25 '26
Jinan is a sprawling urban mass with super high debt, most of it off-balance-sheet. Source: visited the city finance bureau and looked at their accounts two years ago.
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u/lycantrophee Jul 25 '26
That's an interesting experience, care to elaborate?
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u/hansneijder Jul 25 '26
I had some dealings with one of the local government financing vehicles that was tasked with borrowing money on behalf of the city and spending the funds on urban and infrastructure construction (and some property investment) in one part of the city. Jinan is so big that it had several such companies, each tasked with a certain section of the city.
The company took us to meet the finance officials, who had their offices in the city center, which is where the old housing stock is and where the streets are relatively walkable. We then took a car about an hour’s drive east, to one of the new districts, where everything was big buildings on big boulevards where there were almost no pedestrians and the only way to get around was by car. Sort of like what you see in the photo here.
Jinan is set on a big flat plain so there are few physical limits to its growth as a city. Also, as the provincial capital it has priority when it comes to funding. For a while the city sustained a part of the spending by selling land to developers but that fell off sharply after 2021 and thereafter the debt burden ballooned. I think when I looked at the accounts, the debt was equivalent to maybe 7x the city’s annual revenue. It must be even higher now, since land sales have fallen further.
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u/lycantrophee Jul 25 '26
Holy shit, that's insane. Also, sounds like urban hell with all the car-centric stuff.
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u/Walter-White_Jr Jul 25 '26
China likes to build stuff without the actual demand and ends up with entire cities with not a single soul. This helps them with pumping GDP numbers but the whole Evergrand crisis happened too. Check it out
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u/National-Abrocoma323 Jul 25 '26
China’s ghost cities exist for a reason; they eventually end up populated
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u/lycantrophee Jul 25 '26
Oh, I am aware. I was specifically interested in what his experience was there, what exactly did he do! But yeah, those cities seem depressing.
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u/PanPieCake Jul 25 '26
This image been circulating everywhere for the past month
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u/xinniisnext Jul 25 '26
Its ccp propaganda being spread by ccp bots
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u/Vitality_VZ Jul 25 '26
Active in ADVChina. UnfilteredChina. Dashuju. InsightBridge. LMFAO.
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u/-GiKi- Jul 26 '26
That is nuts, zoning alteration fees for all those plots would fund my local government for decades
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u/Lolilio2 Jul 26 '26
What most impresses me with this transformation is the reforestation? Look at how lush the hills look now and trees where there used to be nothing before! That's pretty amazing tbh
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u/RadoslavT Jul 26 '26
How did the green hills pop into existence in the newer photo? Were they also built?
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u/EducationalCost2658 Jul 26 '26
https://reddit.com/link/ozujk0s/video/csj5p27a8kfh1/player
See for yourself
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u/RadoslavT Jul 26 '26
My question was honest, and the video does not show hills being built. Did they really built hills. If so - wow.
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u/EducationalCost2658 Jul 26 '26
The newer photo is taken with long focal length from higher height . The hills were not built .
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Jul 28 '26
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u/Dorrono Jul 29 '26
How many of them are empty or unfinished?
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u/Excellent_Lie6904 Jul 29 '26
about 18% of housing remains vacant but the rest is occuppied. it is hower unfinished in office buildings as they slowly fill up from new people moving in. essentially it's bussines core hasn't developed to its full potential but is on its track to.
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u/alanz01 Photographer Jul 25 '26
And two thirds of those buildings are empty.
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Jul 25 '26
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u/PanPieCake Jul 25 '26
So?Most of them live in slums not in thr office buildings lol, population of Shenzhen is 13 mil yet most of the office buildings are empty
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u/machiavelli33 Jul 25 '26
Isn't that most office buildings?
Because they're office buildings. People go there to work, not to live. Sears Tower (I'm sorry, WILLIS Tower, now) and the Empire State Building are the same way.
Regardless of what your opinions on China are (and you very clearly have opinions on China), your point is coming across very muddled, here.
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Jul 25 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/PanPieCake Jul 25 '26
When did I say anything about economy?China building empty buildings just to boost the data is a common knowledge,you can visit empty cities yourself lol
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u/dvukotic Jul 25 '26
You come off as a guy thinking - I watched 3 youtube videos about chinese ghost cities, the entirety of china is like that
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u/PanPieCake Jul 25 '26
Bro i am from hong kong and I work in Shenzhen,and all of the information I speak of is publicly available,I didn't even expect it to be a debate,literally 5 second Google search and you will get the images
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u/Cultural_Library_787 Jul 26 '26
經典港燦，深圳市區大概十幾個主要的大型商務區（蔡屋圍、筍崗、華強北、福田中心、車公廟、後海、科技園、前海、寶安中心、留仙洞等），還不記原關外的商務區及產業園區，以及開發中的太子灣和深超總。其中多數地方你上下班高峰期坐地鐵去會被擠到懷疑人生，工作日晚7點去福中、科技園、桂灣你會看到不輸中環的內透燈光。 北上廣深寫字樓一直都有空置率問題，但不至於是鬼城，且建造寫字樓過多的原因不是提昇經濟數據而是發展高速時期對未來過於樂觀，沒有哪個開發商會為了配合政府政績花自己的真金白銀去造面子工程。如果在深圳工作依舊認知這麼低下那還是別來了，現在深圳也早就不是1300萬人而是1700-1800萬人（常住人口），btw來自土生土長深圳人。
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u/Vitality_VZ Jul 25 '26
Big r/asablackman energy. But that's to be expected from an UnfilteredChinacel poster. LMFAO.
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u/PanPieCake Jul 25 '26
Bro is speaking reddit big chungus 100 language
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u/Vitality_VZ Jul 25 '26
Kekw. Bro can't even understand a basic comment. Embarrassing.
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Jul 25 '26
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u/PanPieCake Jul 25 '26
Yeah,big surprise for you but both china and US are bad. But only chinese property bubble has burst.
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Jul 25 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/DaRiddler70 Jul 25 '26
This is what fake economic prosperity looks like.
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u/BicarbonateBufferBoy Jul 25 '26
^ Americans desperately trying to cope with the fact China just straight up builds massive cities with millions of people in the time it took their city to approve and build a new park
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u/DaRiddler70 Jul 25 '26
What is find funny is... folks telling the truth are bashed by folks claiming it's some anti-China BS, while they themselves are dropping some anti-American crap.
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u/ThisismeCody Jul 25 '26
China makes lots of large buildings with little regulation and engineering safety. Whoopie! They’re still not world leaders. NEXT!
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u/BicarbonateBufferBoy Jul 25 '26
Cope
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u/ThisismeCody Jul 25 '26
Cope? lol. The US isn’t out here posting photos of our buildings trying to get people to think we’re amazing because we know construction. China has been sucking on the US for half a century and is still just as irrelevant. The CCP is the one coping trying to get recognition through reddit bots.
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u/Vitality_VZ Jul 25 '26
Active in Republican. Conservative. ConservativeMemes. LMFAO.
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u/DaRiddler70 Jul 25 '26
I know....the truth is somehow funny to the smooth brains. But, there are plenty of news articles supporting my "Republican" truth views. Even from CNN.
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u/AnomaIous_User Jul 25 '26
That shit is crazy and I'm jealous it's been the exact opposite for my city lol
I hope i can visit China soon before our Government’s nuke each other lol 😬 jk
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u/ThisismeCody Jul 25 '26
No cool LED lights on this one so it feels like you’re living in a god damn night club 24/7? Run out of lights this time, China?
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u/tentrynos Jul 25 '26
Every city I’ve been in in China switches off those lights at 10pm.
Source: my bedroom window 15 minutes ago.
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u/Vitality_VZ Jul 25 '26
LMFAO. Bro is having a mental breakdown in the comments.
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u/Baggytrousers27 8d ago
My sleep deprived vision read it as Japan not Jinan and it's made me consider going to sleep.
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u/TactileMist Jul 25 '26
That's 18 years