When China Evergrande, once the biggest Chinese property developer, went public in Hong Kong in 2009, the country’s real estate market was red-hot. The frenzy over the company was so intense that for every lucky person who bought at least one share of stock, 46 others were shut out.

中国曾经最大的房地产开发商中国恒大于2009年在香港上市时，中国的房地产市场正一片火热。当时市场对这家公司的热情之高，以至于每有一个幸运的人成功买到至少一股，就有46人排除在外。

How times have changed.

时过境迁。

Now a symbol of China’s real estate boom and bust, Evergrande was delisted from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on Monday, four years after the company first warned that it was facing financial difficulties and two years after it sought bankruptcy protection.

如今已经成为中国房地产市场兴衰象征的中国恒大周一从香港交易所退市。四年前，该公司首次预警财务困境，并在两年前寻求破产保护。

Evergrande’s collapse, with $300 billion in debt, mirrors the slow and painful unwinding of China’s property sector. Government policies staved off a sudden crash, and instead delivered a grinding slowdown.

背负3000亿美元债务的恒大倒下折射出中国房地产行业缓慢而痛苦的崩溃过程。政府政策避免了市场突然崩溃，却带来了漫长的衰退周期。

The housing downturn has not delivered the devastating shock that the United States suffered in the 2008 financial crisis, but it has been hanging over the economy for five years with no end in sight. Last month, new home prices dropped at their fastest pace in nine months and the prices of secondhand homes continued to slide, according to the National Bureau of Statistics of China.

这次房地产低迷虽未带来像美国在2008年金融危机中遭受的那种毁灭性冲击，但其阴影已笼罩中国经济长达五年之久，且至今未见尽头。根据中国国家统计局的数据，上月新房价格创下九个月来最快跌幅，二手房价格也持续下滑。

As the slump continues, the government has stepped in to prop up just enough indebted property companies to prevent a broad collapse. China Vanke, one of the country’s biggest developers, has repeatedly leaned on its top shareholder, the state-owned firm Shenzhen Metro, for loans to cover obligations from its $51 billion of debt. Shenzhen Metro has extended $3.4 billion over nine loans to Vanke this year. Vanke reported on Friday that it lost $1.7 billion in the first six months from January through June, 21 percent worse than a year earlier.

随着行业持续低迷，政府已出手干预，对部分负债房地产公司予以扶持，以防整个行业全面崩溃。作为中国最大的开发商之一，万科已多次依赖其最大股东——国有企业深圳地铁——的借款来应对其3658.7亿元债务带来的偿付义务。今年，深圳地铁透过九笔借款向万科提供了243亿元人民币。万科周五报告称，1月至6月上半年亏损119.47亿元，同比增加了21%。

几乎空无一人的恒大住宅与商业楼盘。

When Beijing rolled out rules in 2020 to curb the excessive borrowing of property developers, it kicked off a downward spiral, pushing many real estate firms to the brink. But the government has stopped short of an industrywide bailout, instead taking steps such as relaxing purchase restrictions and encouraging banks to lend more.

北京在2020年出台规定遏制开发商过度借贷，由此引发了一场螺旋式的下行趋势，将许多房地产企业推到破产边缘。但政府并未进行全行业纾困，而是采取了放宽购房限制和鼓励银行加大放贷力度等措施。

Andrew Collier, a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, said the result was that the “pain is going to go on for a very long period of time.”

哈佛肯尼迪学院高级研究员安德鲁·科利尔表示，其结果是“痛苦将持续很长一段时间”。

It’s a different approach from the one adopted in China’s last significant real estate downturn, around 2015, when Beijing spent hundreds of billions of dollars to pay residents cash to trade in dilapidated shacks in smaller cities and towns. While that policy revived the market, it also unleashed another building boom fueled by developers taking on excessive debt.

这与2015年前后中国上一轮房地产严重低迷时期采取的措施截然不同。当时北京耗资数千亿美元，通过现金补偿方式鼓励中小城市居民换购新房。虽然该政策重振了市场，但也引发了由开发商过度负债推动的新一轮建设热潮。

China is “very leery of pouring good money after bad in the property market,” Mr. Collier said, adding that “the notion that the central government is going to bail out the property sector is just not going to happen.”

科利尔指出，中国“对于向房地产市场投入更多资金填补窟窿非常谨慎”，并补充说，“中央政府根本不会去救地产业。”

While some of the largest developers are still trying to restructure, many smaller ones have gone under. And the downturn has devastated businesses and jobs in sectors that rose up around the real estate boom, from construction to property sales to landscapers.

虽然部分大型开发商仍在尝试债务重组，众多较小的开发商已经倒闭。此次低迷更重创了房地产繁荣周期中衍生的各类行业，包括建筑、房地产销售和景观设计，无数企业与工作岗位遭受冲击。

This month, Hong Kong’s High Court ordered China South City Holdings, a midsize property developer, to liquidate after a judge ruled that it had not made significant progress on its restructuring plans.

本月，香港高等法院下令中型房地产开发商华南城控股清盘，此前一名法官裁定该公司在其重组计划上没有取得实质性进展。

南京的一处恒大楼盘，摄于本月。

The continuing property market slide comes at a vulnerable moment for the Chinese economy. A trade war has limited China’s ability to rev up its export engine, while consumer spending remains soft. The government is plowing money into semiconductors, robotics and other technologies, but those investments are unlikely to pay off quickly enough to fill the hole left by a shrinking property sector.

房地产市场持续下滑正值中国经济的脆弱时刻。贸易战限制了中国发动其出口引擎的能力，而消费者支出依然疲软。政府虽然向半导体、机器人和其他科技领域投入资金，但这些投资难以迅速填补房地产萎缩留下的缺口。

It’s hard to overstate the real estate industry’s importance. At its peak, the sector accounted for roughly 30 percent of China’s economy. Proceeds from land sales to property firms filled local government coffers. Many Chinese households turned to real estate, believing it was a safe investment for their savings.

房地产行业的重要性如何强调都不为过。在其鼎盛时期，该行业约占中国经济总量的30%。土地出让收入充实着地方政府财政，众多中国家庭也将积蓄投入房地产，视其为最稳妥的投资选择。

The recent data is alarming. While new construction has slowed drastically, the inventory of available homes is growing, not shrinking.

近期数据令人忧心：尽管新开工项目大幅放缓，库存不减反增。

In the first seven months of 2025, the amount of new housing under construction nationwide was down almost 20 percent from the same period a year ago, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. The number of vacant homes available for sale is more than twice the historical average, according to Yicai, a financial media and research group backed by the Shanghai municipal government.

根据国家统计局的数据，2025年前七个月，全国新开工住房面积较去年同期下降了近20%。据上海市政府背景的财经媒体和研究集团第一财经称，目前商品房待售面积是历史平均值的两倍有余。

In February, Victoria Yu, 35, listed for sale an apartment she shared with her husband in Hefei, an industrial city in central China. They had bought the home three years ago for about $330,000 and spent an additional $80,000 decorating and furnishing the apartment. They listed the property, fully furnished, for about their initial purchase price.

今年2月，35岁的维多利亚·于（音）将她与丈夫在中国中部工业城市合肥共同拥有的一套公寓挂牌出售。三年前，他们以约234万元的价格买下了这套房子，并另外花费了56万元进行装修和购置家具。他们将这套带全套家具的房产以接近其最初购买价的价格挂牌。

Dozens of real estate agents and potential buyers expressed interest, but all the offers came in at least 15 percent below her asking price. When buyers came in with a lowball offer, she was furious.

数十名房地产经纪人和潜在买家表示了兴趣，但所有报价都比她的要价至少低15%。当买家提出极低的报价时，她非常愤怒。

“I wondered why it was like this, and how it could be so bad,” she said.

“我就觉得怎么会这个样子了，有这么差劲，”她说。

房地产市场的持续下滑正值中国经济的脆弱时刻。贸易战限制了中国发动其出口引擎的能力，而消费者支出依然疲软。

Ms. Yu, a marketing officer at an agricultural technology firm, eventually pulled the listing and decided to stay in the apartment because she could not accept losing more than $100,000. She said her mistake was believing that buying an apartment was a sound investment.

于女士在一家农业科技公司做销售，她最终撤下房源，决定继续住在这套公寓里，因为她无法接受超过70万元的损失。她说，她的错误在于相信买房是一项稳健的投资。

Her real estate agent advised her to accept a smaller loss now, as “it will be even harder to sell later.” Ms. Yu also does not think property prices in Hefei, a so-called second-tier city that is not an economic and political hub like Beijing or Shanghai, will ever rebound to past peaks.

房屋中介建议她现在接受较小的损失，因为“以后会更难卖出去”。于女士也认为，合肥这样的二线城市不像北京或上海那样是政治和经济中心，房价永远不会回升到过去的峰值。

This month, Goldman Sachs said in a research note that the July sales data showed that the few signs of recovering prices in the real estate market had been limited to the top-tier cities.

本月，高盛在一份研究报告中表示，7月的销售数据显示，房地产市场复苏的一点迹象仅限于一线城市。

But even in those cities, the local governments are taking steps to spur demand — a sharp reversal of years of measures to tamp down speculative buying. This month, Beijing’s municipal government rolled back longstanding restrictions limiting the number of homes that residents can buy in the city’s suburban areas. Analysts said this might spur other major cities such as Shenzhen and Shanghai to follow with similar moves to ease the supply glut.

但即使在一线城市，地方政府也在采取措施刺激需求——这与多年来抑制投机性购房的措施形成了鲜明逆转。本月，北京市政府取消了长期以来限制居民在郊区购房数量的措施。分析人士表示，这可能会促使深圳和上海等其他大城市采取类似举措，以缓解供应过剩问题。

When Lily Zhang, a technology industry worker, sold her apartment in Beijing this month, she was surprised by how weak the market was. She eventually sold the place for less than what she was asking. But she felt lucky to secure a deal, having encountered mostly “window shoppers” who had no intention of buying.

科技行业工作者张莉莉（音）本月卖掉北京的房子时，对市场的疲软程度感到惊讶。她最终以低于要价的价格卖掉了房子。但她很庆幸能成交，因为她遇到的大多是无意购买的“只看不买的人”。

Ms. Zhang said her experience as a Beijing homeowner was a roller-coaster ride. She jumped on the opportunity to buy in 2016, feeling pressured because apartment prices were rising so quickly. The prices continued to surge, prompting agents to call her to gauge her interest in selling. She kept putting it off until she and her husband had a baby, and their apartment suddenly felt too small.

张女士说，在北京当业主的经历就像坐过山车。她在2016年抓住机会买了房，当时因为房价上涨得太快，她感到必须赶紧买。之后价格继续飙升，中介打电话给她，询问是否有意出售。她一直未出手，直到她和丈夫有了孩子，他们的房子突然感觉就不够住了。

But by then, the market had softened and prices were plummeting. She eventually broke even on her purchase, “as if nothing had happened” over the past nine years, she said.

但那时市场已经疲软，房价暴跌。她最终没赚没亏，等于这九年“什么都仿佛没有发生”，她说。

“No one was willing to offer a price and that was very scary,” Ms. Zhang added. “When no one offered me a price, I panicked.”

“没有人跟我开价的时候我就比较慌了，”张女士补充道。“都没有任何人愿意开价，这件事情就是很可怕的。”