The Dilution Effect of the Hong Kong Home Ownership Scheme's Semi-Ownership Model on Post-Disaster Renovation Responsibilities: A Case Study of the Hong Fok Court Fire
Abstract
The semi ownership model of Hong Kong's public housing scheme reduces the burden of home ownership for low - and middle-income groups, but results in unclear responsibilities for post disaster building repairs and mutual shirking of responsibilities among all parties involved. This article takes the 2025 Hongfu Garden fire as a case study to analyze the internal logic of the dilution of repair responsibility caused by semi property rights. Research has shown that the blurred boundary of property rights breaks the principle of equal rights and responsibilities, and the multi-party pattern breeds the collective action problem of free riding. The imbalance of rights, responsibilities, and benefits reduces the initiative of all parties to repair, and the combination of multiple factors leads to the systematic governance failure of insufficient security before the disaster and delayed repair after the disaster. This article combines the practical experience of shared ownership housing in the UK, Singapore, and mainland China, and proposes improvement plans from multiple dimensions such as division of rights and responsibilities, financial security, contract optimization, collaborative governance, regulatory constraints, and risk sharing, in order to provide practical reference for improving the disaster management system of affordable housing in Hong Kong, and also provide reference ideas for the long-term management of shared ownership housing and various types of affordable housing in mainland China.
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