Second Home Ownership in Transitional Urban China

China has recently experienced a massive growth in second home ownership. This paper argues that second home ownership in Chinese cities is not only a result of an increasingly mature housing market but, more importantly, an unintended consequence of socialist housing policies and institutions, such as the subsidized sale of public rental housing and associated partial property rights, the continued provision of subsidized housing by work units, the continuing household registration system and the lack of property tax. Using the 2005 China General Social Survey, this paper empirically studies the patterns and dynamics of second home ownership in urban China. While households' socio-economic status contributes to conventional second home ownership, the persisting socialist housing policies and institutions have led to the unique phenomena of owing one home with partial property rights and owning a second home, and renting the primary home even in the public sector and owning a second home.