I think this is a key point to catch in this discussion. Like a sibling comment said, this is the way things are done in his EU country, but the big difference is that EU countries are higher-trust with way more financial regulation and accountability. China's economy is fundamentally not predicated on the rule of law and that's an important point here.

This is not true. In China, buyers have to pay the down payment and mortgage before the apartment is built, but for some reason if the builder left the apartment half built, buyers do get their money back from the bank.

No. You don’t pay off a mortgage before the home is built lol. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.

You have to pay in full to the developer. By taking out a loan which consists of a downpayment.

The developer now has 100% of the money. And the buyer has nothing but debt.

The developers are either never breaking ground or never completing the building. Using the money to buy more land and sell more homes.

When they file for bankruptcy. The banks still need the money back from the buyer. Since the buyer has no home because it was never finished they effectively lose their investment and their lives as debt collection takes their cars, live-in home. Etc.

Stop spreading misinformation that buyers aren’t suffering. This is people’s lives at stake. Lying to people and pretending like nothing is wrong makes you a terrible human being when people’s lives are at stake.

Can you please make your substantive points without breaking the site guidelines? You broke more than one of them with this post.

I'm sure you have a good point about mortgages and developers and banks, but it's more important not to set the forum on fire, and that is what the site guidelines exist to avoid.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Nice one. Flag it and hide it so you can protect the guy defending the CCP. Nice to know HN is a propaganda forum.

You have to pay in full to the developer. By taking out a loan which consists of a downpayment. The developer now has 100% of the money. And the buyer has nothing but debt. The developers are either never breaking ground or never completing the building. Using the money to buy more land and sell more homes. When they file for bankruptcy. The banks still need the money back from the buyer. Since the buyer has no home because it was never finished they effectively lose their investment and their lives as debt collection takes their cars, live-in home. Etc. Stop spreading misinformation that buyers aren’t suffering.