Here in China the housing maintenance fund is also known as the pension for apartments.

 

　　Apparently, the fund is to be used for the maintenance and repair of property.

 

　　However, applying to use the money is an extremely difficulty process.

 

　　Li Dong has the details.

 

　　Water leakages, aging equipment, malfunctioning elevators and other common problems like these have been causing headaches for property owners in recent years.

 

　　Repair and maintenance work within a community need to be covered by a compulsory fund which property owners contribute towards.

 

　　The housing maintenance fund is made up of deposits from property owners with a community.

 

　　Owners can only gain access to such funds after submitting an application which then needs to be approved by relevant authorities.

 

　　The procedure starts with lodging an application to the municipal housing fund management center.

 

　　Then the repair work is assessed by professional organizations.

 

　　After that, the housing fund management center will file the approved assessment report to the local real estate bureau.

 

　　The bureau then informs the bank where the maintenance fund is located to transfer the money to the property owner committee.

 

　　Zhang Daxian is the director of the property owner's committee of a residential area in Beijing.

 

　　He says getting access to the money is even more difficult because his community changed its name three times.

 

　　"Our community has used three names. Some of the property owners put money in the account which was established under the previous name of the community. So the money in the account under the previous community name can't be used because the community now has a new account, even though the money was deposited by the property owners in our community. I asked the authorities. They said the current policies don't support our application to use the money."

 

　　Zhao Yanling, is a member of a property owner's committee for a community in south Beijing, it began lodging an application in 2010.

 

　　"They refused our application. One of the excuses they gave is that many property owners didn't pay their share of the fund. The authorities want us to collect the money. But we are the property owner committee; we don't have the authority and capability to collect unpaid fees. That's why we can't use the fund."

 

　　Shu Kexin, is an expert on the protection of property owner's rights, he says the maintenance fund should be returned to property owners.

 

　　"The money in the maintenance fund belongs to the property owners. Property owners have the right to decide how to use it. The Property Law and related property management regulations entitle property owners to do so. The government department is right to prevent the money from being misused. However, they should have no excuse to refuse giving the money to property owners."

 

　　Guan Zhenhua, director of a property owner's committee in Beijing says their maintenance fund can be better managed if the money were to be transferred to them.

 

　　"The maintenance work in the community can be carried out using the interest earned from the huge fund. Plus, if the fund is put in the bank, the money won't lose its value. But if we can use the money, we can increase the fund by using financing methods."

 

　　According to a report by the China Youth Daily, housing maintenance funds nationwide amount to hundreds of billions of yuan.

 

　　Gaining access to the money is already a complicated procedure.

 

　　And the way such a huge amount of money is managed still remains unclear.

 

　　For CRI, I am Li Dong.