Case introduction

         Li purchased an affordable housing located in a certain district of Beijing from a developer, signed the "Affordable Housing Purchase Contract", and paid the purchase price. After actually moving into the house, it was found that there were varying degrees of quality problems with the drainage, walls, floors, etc. Li has communicated with the developer multiple times about the issue of house repair, but has not reached a solution. Li believes that the developer has breached the contract and has filed a lawsuit with the Haidian District Court in Beijing, where the defendant resides, on the grounds of a dispute over the housing sales contract.

Court trial

        After examination, the Haidian District Court believes that disputes over policy housing sales contracts should be governed by real estate disputes. Economically affordable housing belongs to policy housing and the involved property is located in a certain district. Therefore, the Haidian District Court has no jurisdiction over this case and recommends that the parties file a lawsuit with a court with jurisdiction in accordance with relevant provisions of the Civil Procedure Law.

Judge's statement

       According to Article 28 (2) of the Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on the Application of the Civil Procedure Law of the People's Republic of China, disputes over policy housing sales contracts shall be governed by real estate disputes. Economically affordable housing refers to residential buildings constructed according to the national plan for the construction of economically affordable housing. The purchase and sale contract of affordable housing belongs to a type of policy based housing purchase and sale contract. In addition, policy based housing purchase and sale contracts also include houses that enjoy national taxation, welfare, policy incentives, and other conditions such as limited housing, self occupied commercial housing, low rent housing, co owned property housing, preferential price housing, unit self managed housing, military property housing, small property rights housing, rural housing, and public rental housing, as well as houses on rural collective land. Here is a reminder that disputes arising from the sale and purchase contracts of ordinary commercial housing should be determined by the jurisdiction court in accordance with the general jurisdictional regulations. If there is an agreement on jurisdiction between the parties, the agreement shall prevail. If there is no agreement, jurisdiction shall be determined according to the defendant's domicile or the place of contract performance.

       This article is transferred from the WeChat official account of "Beijing Haidian". Thank you.