<- Click to filter by commenter
| 3 |
Pressure is About Expectation I don't think it's only the people in Shanghai or some Chinese cities who are suffocated with pressures. I think it's the society we are in that's creating this pressure. Twenty years ago, when there e-mails and cell phones weren't prevalent, people could work more slowly with lots of lays in between. People didn't expect you to get back to them right away. But along with the modern hi-technologies, one can be chased everywhere he or she goes to. Not only there are cell phones, e-mails, paging serive, but also the wireless Blackberry. One is without excuse not knowing what people want of him/her because he/she can be reached any time. On the flip side though, modern workers are a lot more efficient than their counterparts from 20 years ago. I have two children: one in the Bay area and one in the LA area. Both of them always complain how busy they are from thier work. My daughter, who is a young consultant, says she often has to work until 9 or 10 PM. Sometimes, she has to go in to work on weekends, or she sleeps all day on weekends to catch up the sleep. I'm glad that I don't have to work anymore. No work= less pressure=less compalint. |
| 2 |
Back from Beijing Trip First on CTRIP and ELONG membership cards: They claim that they can save you 50% of the hotel rates. Bull! Who pays rack rate anyway? Watch out whenever you have to prepay a hotel room. Let me share with you a bad experience we had booking a hotel room through ELONG. One time my husband's secretary booked us a "lake-view" room at Sofitel Hotel in Hangzhou. We paid a premium (I believe it was over USD100)for the room as it supposely had lake view. We arrived in the evening, but didn't seem to see any lake image. The next morning, we still couldn't get a lake glimpse, so we went to the Front Desk to check. We were then pointed out in the distance, through the corner of our eyes we spot (barely) something seemingly like a lake. The view was so skimpy that one has to look carefly with a telescope to see it. We protested, but was told that our room was booked through ELONG, and we had to contact ELONG for any change. Who had the time and energy to look into such things then? Incidentally, we went to Hangzhou again late April this year. This time we booked a gardent-view room at Hyatt Regency at RMB 900 + taxes. Although the room didn't have a lake view, the hotel itself is built in front of Wesk Lake. Within one minute walking out of the hotel, we were at the lake shore having an unobstructed 280 degree view of the lake. We booked the room directly through the Hyatt's reservation website. The room was held with our credit card until 6 PM of the arrival date. The room could be cancelled prior to that time without any penalty. I advice all who are coming to China to book their rooms that are cancelabe without penalty. That means if you check in the hotel and find the room not acceptable, you can still turn the room down. As for airfares, I found that you can buy tickets at some sort of discounts with any major airlines. It doens't have to be the particular airlines you're flying on, nor a travel agency. I often go to www.goldenholidays to check the flights and fares before I call for a reservation. Buying air tickets in China is mostly on one-way basis. Flying from Shanghai to Beijing, you can usually get a 10-20% discount, but returning route has much greater discount, generally up to 65% of the discount. So do a little homework, check some travel websites and you will have some pleasant discoveries. Unfortunately, most of the web deals are written in Chinese, so if you don't read Chinese, you might not have as much choices. Next on the travel cards: It's really very annoying to sit at Beijing airport waiting area and have the so called farmer agent continue to approach you to give you the cards. How they were allowed to go into the waiting area is beyond me. I thought only the ticketed passengers are allowed to enter the security-cleared area. I guess, in China, many things one is not allowed to do is allowed here. |
| 1 |
When the House Prices Goes Down I've kept a keen eye reading real estate - related news, in Shanghai area in particular, as I'm a home owner here. Being a real estate professional in California before, I am not surprised to see the property up-trend has reversed. "What goes up must come down" as the cliche goes. Even though prices will eventually go back up again, but the increases of property values during the last three years have been too soon and too fast. This kind of exuberance was unhealthy and illogical. In a way, I'm glad that the government has finally come up with some rulings to intervene. Anybody who has been trying to buy properties in Shanghai, or some other Chinese cities, must be so fed up with frustrations not being able to find new properties to buy. I went with a girl friend early this year trying to purchase a flat in several complex. Every sales office we went to, we were told that every unit was sold out. One development in Jinan District was about to go on the market in late February. We went there, was told to register our names in a booklet. I asked whether that meant we're reserving a unit. The answer was no as no one could reserve any unit. They will be lotteried on 2/26, so just be there on that morning before 9. Then why bother putting your name down. What's strange was that the sales woman told us that 80% of the units were reserved. Wasn't that a contradiction of what she had just said? Leaving the sales office, my friend and I went to a few real estate companies nearby. When we inquired about this complex, one sales man said, he has units on any floor with all types of floor plans. He even showed up Zeroxed copies of the floor plans. When we asked him the selling prices, he replied, " Just add 160,000-200,000(RMB) to the asking prices on the opening day(2/26). Will somebody tell me what these money is for, and for whom? I heard that this is a way developers hiked their properties by setting aside many units to sell through real estate agents. That said, I am glad to know the recent government rulings have put a heavy dent on developers' sales. Indeed I heard many real estate companies are closing some of their sales offices to save money. As to how much prices will come down and how long the down trend will last, that's anybody's guess. I don't think developers are hurt yet, not if they have reaped in loads of money during the past 2-3 years. My guess is that if many units remain unsold, whether from developers or from private home owners, by year end, we shall see prices coming down more drastically. Properties in downtown area should be able to weather the price drops better than suburban areas or complexes with more than 30% of the homeowners being investors. In California, many lenders won't lend in a condo project that has more than 30 % of the units non-owner occupied. I don't know if it is till the case though as I moved out LA in 1993. So folks, if you're planning to buy a flat, just hang on. It's going to be a buyers' market within a half year. People can at least pick and choose and netotiate the prices now. So let's wait and see. |