Real estate developers team up to acquire land parcels

More than a month has passed since the release of the August 28 existing-home sales new policy, and as of press time, 5 cities have released their detailed implementation rules. In terms of content, the general framework is consistent across all regions, while details vary from place to place.

The five sets of detailed rules all follow the same time dividing line. Taking August 28, 2026 as the boundary, all new residential land plots with transfer announcements released after this date will prioritize the existing-home sales model.

From the perspective of the land market, the first change appears in the list of bidders. Although some plots are still in the transition period of the new policy, the phenomenon of "team bidding" has emerged among bidders.

For example, among the four plots in Shanghai's 10th land auction, three were won by consortia. For the most popular Gumei plot in Minhang District, all three bidding groups are consortia: one team consists of Xiangyu and C&D, another includes China Merchants, Nanshan and Binjiang, and the third is China Construction Second Engineering Bureau and Yuexiu.

Hangzhou has shown a more consistent trend. The first residential plot for transfer in the main urban area after August 28, the Shiqiao plot in Gongshu District, and the second plot, the Shuangqiao plot in Yungu on September 29, were all won by consortia.

Joint land acquisition is not a new thing, but the triggering mechanism this time is completely different from any previous case.

01

The 10th batch of land auctions on September 29 is the most concentrated event of joint land acquisition in Shanghai in 2026.

A total of 10 bidders registered for the four plots. The two plots transacted at the reserve price each had only one bidder: the only bidder for the North Bund plot in Hongkou District is itself a cooperation platform between Guomao and the North Bund Group, and the only bidder for another plot at Paotaishan in Baoshan District is Xiangyu Real Estate, which participated in the auction independently.

For the two plots with actual competition, all three bidding groups for the Gumei plot in Minhang District are consortia, and the only consortium among the five bidding groups for the Jiangwan plot in Yangpu District finally won the bid, while the other four independent bidders including Lianfa, Yuexiu, China Construction Yipin and Greentown all returned empty-handed.

The particularity of this land auction lies in its timing: 24 hours before the auction started, four municipal departments in Shanghai had just issued the detailed implementation rules, making Shanghai the second city to release supporting detailed rules after Beijing. However, the transfer announcement of these plots was released before August 28, which belongs to the transition category of "announced before August 28, land acquired after August 28" according to Shanghai's rules, so the pre-sale conditions can still be implemented in accordance with the original policy, while pre-sale fund supervision and individual mortgage loans are implemented in accordance with the new regulations.

For the 9th batch of auctions held one week earlier, the bidding structure showed the same pattern. The starting prices of the three plots decreased sequentially from 6.684 billion yuan to 1.521 billion yuan, and the bidding structure reversed accordingly. For the Daning plot in Jing'an District with the highest starting price, both bidding groups are consortia, and 78 rounds of bidding only pushed the premium rate to 5.48%; for the Jinqiao plot in Pudong with the lowest starting price, four out of the five bidding groups participated independently, and 143 rounds of fierce bidding pushed the premium rate to 29.65%. The higher the total price of the land, the more necessary it is to rely on a consortium to qualify for bidding, and the harder it is to push up the transaction price.

From the results, there are almost no enterprises that can independently bid until the final round for high-total-price plots in Shanghai. There are few solo participants left in Shanghai's land auctions.

02

Hangzhou is another city where consortia appear very frequently, and the main participants are private enterprises.

After the August 28 new policy, the first two residential plots transferred in Hangzhou's main urban area were all won by consortia. On September 17, the plot in the Shiqiao sub-district of Gongshu District was won by the consortium of Zhongtian and Haiwei at 1.537 billion yuan, with a premium rate of 6.22%; on September 29, the plot in the Shuangqiao sub-district of Yungu, West Lake District was won by the consortium of Greentown and Haiwei at 946 million yuan, with a premium rate of 33.05% after 48 rounds of tug-of-war bidding.

What truly reveals the trend is not how many times consortia have won, but how many independent bidders remain at the registration stage. The plot in the Shiqiao sub-district of Gongshu District only had 2 bidders, while in the same sector, the Weixing Xingyi Jiayingfu plot transferred on July 29, 2025 had 9 real estate enterprises participating in the auction, with a final premium rate of 28.1% and a transaction floor price of 19,627 yuan per square meter, about 3,300 yuan per square meter higher than this transaction. In the same sector, the number of participating real estate enterprises dropped from 9 to 2, and the premium rate dropped from 28.1% to 6.22%.

The Beishi sub-district plot in Xiaoshan District, which was transacted on the same day as the Shuangqiao sub-district plot in Yungu, West Lake District, provides another dimension of comparison. The last transfer in this sector was on April 30 this year, when the consortium of Greentown and Binjiang won the plot at 2.609 billion yuan, with a premium rate as high as 57.26% and a floor price of 36,170 yuan per square meter; on September 29, the plot XS070101-60 in the Beishi sub-district of the same sector was independently won by Binjiang Group at 1.865 billion yuan, with a premium rate of 23.10% and a floor price of 30,775 yuan per square meter. Within five months, the premium rate of the same sector dropped from 57.26% to 23.10%, and the floor price decreased by 5,395 yuan per square meter.

After the implementation of the new policy, the overall price benchmark is moving down.

Hangzhou gathers a group of the most active private real estate enterprises in China, which are characterized by limited total capital but strong judgment on plots in core cities. After the new existing-home sales policy lengthens the capital occupation cycle, the decline in premium rate and floor price reflects the latest judgment of these enterprises.

From the changes in land auctions before and after the new policy in Shanghai and Hangzhou, "team-based" joint land acquisition is becoming the choice of more and more real estate enterprises. If the essence of previous joint land acquisition was "land price anxiety", now it is more about "cash flow anxiety".

Calculations from Pure Real Estate Research show that the full implementation of the existing-home sales model will fundamentally change the cash flow logic of commercial housing development. Developers can no longer rely on pre-sale proceeds in the early stage to cover subsequent construction investment, but need to fully advance the land price and construction and installation costs until the project is completed and accepted before recovering funds. The capital occupation cycle is extended from 6 months to 1 year to more than 2 years. Calculation of typical projects in sample cities shows that the additional financial cost of the existing-home sales model compared to the off-plan property model accounts for about 11% of the total land price.

The particularity of this cost is that it cannot be covered by raising the selling price. The selling price is determined by the supply and demand of the sector, while the financial cost is rigid. There are only three ways to absorb it: extend the chain of self-owned capital, obtain cheaper capital, or find partners to share the cost. Obviously, the third way is the fastest to take effect.

In the future, project cooperation and consortium-based land acquisition will become a more common choice.

This article is from the WeChat official account "Ding Zuyu Reviews Real Estate Market", written by the editorial department, and authorized for release by 36Kr.