The Beijing municipal government will work to contain housing price hikes and provide low-rent housing for poor residents, Vice and Acting Mayor Guo Jinlong said yesterday.

He said the government would strengthen macro control on the property market, adjust land provisions and keep a tight housing credit policy, among other strategies, to achieve the goal.

The government would spend 2.9 billion yuan (US$40 million) to build and purchase 500,000 square meters of houses and flats and rent them to low-income residents at affordable prices, Guo told about 770 lawmakers at the annual session of the legislature.

Beijing would also build a total of 7.5 million square meters of houses and flats with reasonable prices and sizes this year, he said.

The government also planned to spend 580 million yuan to renovate houses that were in dangerous condition, Guo said.

The average property price in China's 70 large and medium-sized cities in December was up 10.5 percent from the same month of the previous year, while in Beijing it was up 17.5 percent, according to the National Development and Reform Commission.

Officials with the Ministry of Construction have said that some developers are only interested in building luxurious apartments for high profit.

Some development companies hoarded land and apartments or spread false information to create a public fear of housing shortages so they could drive up prices, Vice Minister of Construction Qi Ji said.

Earlier this month, the State Council, China's cabinet, made amendments to the Regulation on Administrative Punishment for Price Violations to allow more stringent penalties for illegal price manipulations.