Shanghai Daily news

Shanghai residents will be able to borrow more from the city's public housing fund from next Tuesday as the government tries to ease the financial pressure faced by the public in buying homes.
Shanghai residents, who have paid money into the fund in the recent six months, can borrow up to 200,000 yuan (US$24,100) from the Shanghai Provident Fund Management Center to finance their home purchases compared with the current ceiling of 130,000 yuan.
Legal employees in Shanghai pay a certain proportion of their salaries to the city's public housing fund on a monthly basis. The fund is used by the government as a channel to help local residents get housing loans with interest rate lower than bank lending rate.
The interest rate of five year-plus loans from the fund is 4.23 percent, compared with 5.31 percent offered by commercial banks.
"The policy is revised after analyzing the current situation of the local real estate market," said the center in a statement.
Shanghai's housing prices have been rising for five consecutive years.
The rise in the loan limit "will ease local residents' pressure of repaying their housing loans," said an official of the Agricultural Bank of China's Shanghai branch.
However, for those who have already borrowed from the fund, they will have to pay back the previous loan before they are allowed to borrow up to the new increased amount which can only be used to purchase their second home, said the official.