Home buyers occupy ‘rotting’ and unfinished properties

BEIJING: For six months, home for Xu is a room in a high-rise apartment in the southern Chinese city of Guilin that she bought three years ago, attracted by brochures touting its riverfront views and the city’s clean air.

Her living conditions, however, are far from those promised – unpainted walls, holes where electric sockets should be and no gas or running water. Every day she climbs up and down several flights of stairs to carrying up heavy water bottles.