Chapter 766
Liu Xu's brows furrowed even more tightly, and the worry in her voice was like cotton wool soaked in water, muffled and heavy:
"Loan? Doesn't that mean borrowing money to build a house? What if... I mean, what if the house can't be sold? How are we going to pay back such a large loan? That's not a small amount..."
Wang Dachui's face darkened.
"Liu Xu, I find you're becoming increasingly disappointing. You're an intellectual, but how can your thinking be so outdated and out of touch with the times? This is the general trend in business going forward. Even without capital, you can still achieve great things. This is permitted by national policy!"
He waved his hand impatiently and said:
"Okay, stop talking! If it can't be sold, it will definitely be sold! You're such a jinx!"
Liu Xu looked at her husband's furious expression, moved her lips, but finally swallowed the rest of her words.
She turned around silently and looked at the coastline in the distance, but she made up her mind: the passbook containing her secret money under the mattress must be kept secret from him.
Ever since Wang Dachui started speculating in stocks, she felt something was wrong, so she began to save some money in her daily life and even hid some of the jewelry he had given her in the past. That was her way out.
The sea breeze, carrying a salty smell, blew over, lifting the strands of hair in front of her forehead and sticking them to her sweaty forehead.
The fishy smell was mixed with the smell of dust coming from a distant construction site, like an invisible net that was getting tighter and tighter.
In the spring of 1993, the sunshine in Zhucheng was stronger than the previous year. Besides the smell of the sea, there was also an almost insane heat in the air.
Like sharks smelling blood, developers, armed with "tourism and vacation" approval documents, are grabbing land on prime coastlines.
With the red line drawn and the barbed wire fence erected, the mudflats where the seafarers once walked on shells have suddenly become the blueprint for an "international resort". Even though there is nothing there yet, the price has already been driven up to a sky-high level.
Due to the speculation of passing the parcel, the prices of pre-sale houses have risen continuously. The price of villas near the coastline has exceeded 10,000 yuan per square meter, far exceeding the local residents' monthly income of less than 300 yuan.
Someone has calculated that an average family would have to save for 30 years without eating or drinking to buy a balcony.
Yet, such high housing prices acted like a stimulant, making investors' eyes blaze with excitement. The motto, "The more expensive, the higher the price, the more valuable it becomes," spread faster than the flu across drinking tables and teahouses.
There are long queues in front of the bank's loan counters. Some people carry fake income certificates, while others ask relatives and friends to guarantee their loans, just to be able to borrow a little more so that they can invest more in this hot real estate market.
The foundation of Wang Dachui's villa project had just been laid, and the crane on the construction site was like a thin needle, stuck in the mudflat where ducks were once raised.
He stood in a makeshift shed, holding the newly approved loan contract in his hand, the smile on his lips more dazzling than the sun.
In those days, cement tankers from the construction site lined up on the road, with yellow and white truck bodies connected in a string, and black smoke gushing out of their exhaust pipes, which made the weeds on the roadside wilt.
The real estate agents squatted under the shade of trees by the roadside, with their trouser legs rolled up to their knees, revealing their tanned calves. They had more land plot drawings in their hands than playing cards, and they stuffed stacks of them into people's arms. The shouts of "Increase by 100 yuan per hour" were more frequent than the waves.
In July, Wang Dachui’s “Guanhai No. 1” model room was successfully completed.
The off-white exterior was covered in imported tiles, the glass curtain wall reflected the blue sky and white clouds, and the entrance was covered in red carpet, stretching from the road to the entrance. People who came to view the house squeezed through the door, almost breaking down the threshold of the model room.
He stood in the crowd, listening to the addresses of "Mr. Wang" and "Big Boss", and felt that he had never felt so glorious in his life.
But when I looked at the data in the evening, there were only a few customers who placed orders.
Wang Dachui believes that this is a temporary situation and the house will be sold once the surrounding area is built.
He didn't know at this time that the wind stopped faster than anything else.
Just a few days later, Huang rushed in like crazy on his motorcycle, and the Hongtashan cigarette box on the handlebars fell to the ground:
"It's over! It's over! The bank has stopped lending! The higher-ups have issued a notice to investigate illegal development!"
Wang Dachui rushed to the Land Bureau. The long queue at the door dispersed, and the agents on the steps looked like stepped-on cigarette butts, with their heads drooped.
In the service hall, the planning map was covered by a newly posted "suspension of approval" notice, and the small flags in the sand table fell down, like a wheat field swept by a strong wind.
Later he learned that Zhucheng had already collapsed by then.
The amount of land sold has exceeded the city's carrying capacity by eight times, and land prices have skyrocketed, with an annual increase of 1,900%.
The non-performing rate of banks' real estate loans has exceeded 40%. 90% of the projects under construction in the city rely on high-interest financing, just like a leaky gas tank that will explode at any time.
This abnormal development model of expansion in a short period of time finally ushered in regulation from above.
The orders were issued quickly and harshly. First, the financial lifeline was cut off. The Western State-owned Bank issued an order to stop all special real estate loans and to recover the funds that had illegally flowed into the real estate market.
Developers are required to provide proof of 30% of their own funds, a hurdle that stops more than half of them.
In just one week, 1.2 billion yuan was withdrawn from Zhucheng, like a balloon that had been punctured, deflated in an instant.
What followed was an investigation and punishment. Dozens of bribery cases in the banking system were uncovered, and all the channels for those who relied on "loan brokers" to act as go-betweens were cut off.
Dozens of kilograms of illegally obtained gold bars and more than 30 million yuan in cash were recovered.
Next was the land liquidation. A working group was set up in Zhucheng to stop the review of all land transfer contracts and revoke more than 100 approval documents for "related plots of land".
Several illegal land reclamation projects were demolished, and more than ten kilometers of occupied coastline were reclaimed.
This series of drastic measures caused Zhucheng's housing prices to plummet by 70%. Developers with broken capital chains fled en masse, leaving behind more than 300 unfinished buildings, and the bad debt rate of financial institutions exceeded 55%.
A large number of migrant workers' wages were in arrears, land disputes surged, the urban credit system collapsed, and the economy was severely damaged.
Wang Dachui squatted on the construction site, looking at the distant beach. Villas like his were rotting on the mudflats. Some of the windows were smashed by homeless people, becoming shelters from wind and rain.
He remembered the 170,000 yuan he made from trading three acres of land last year, remembered what he and Liu Xu said about "borrowing a chicken to lay eggs", and remembered himself banging on the car window and shouting "What are you afraid of?"
But now, that "chicken" not only stopped laying eggs, but also pecked away all his belongings - the company's accounts were frozen, the mortgaged land was seized, and even his once high-spirited car was towed away.
After the bubble burst, these villas were sold at a bargain price of 400 yuan per square meter, but no one was interested in them and they became shelters for homeless people.
A 38-story building that was planned to be a landmark building in Pearl City has also been quietly stopped. The steel frame stands in the city center, becoming the iconic landscape of the "Bubble Economy Museum".
In the distance, a few homeless people were making a fire in an unfinished building. The smoke rose crookedly and mixed with the clouds in the sky.
The cash that was once waved, the crazy quotes, and the myth of "Pearl City Speed" eventually burst like a bubble.
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