Land market "ignites when meeting the best", who is buying land crazily?

Recently, multiple high premium land parcels in Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Suzhou have once again ignited the land market, as new home sales have not completely stabilized, the land market is "ready to move". In fact, since 2025, companies have already shown signs of strength on the investment side. After experiencing the market "big waves sweeping the sand", under the logic of improving the housing market, real estate companies have been eyeing prime land in core areas. According to key statistics from CRIC on land transactions in 30 cities, the proportion of premium transactions in the first seven months of 2025 reached 30%. Correspondingly, the total amount of the top 100 land acquisitions increased by 33% year-on-year. On one hand, there is the "cooling down housing market in high temperatures", on the other hand, there is the "hot land market in the low season", some are withdrawing, some are rushing. Who is actively acquiring land to replenish inventory? Who is crazily "grabbing land"? 01 Proportion of premium land parcels in 30 cities reaches a three-year high There are signs of stabilization in the scale and heat of the land market Currently, while the national land market transaction volume is still in a "low season" and has not shown signs of stabilization, the core 30 cities, mainly first- and second-tier cities, are leading the way in stabilization. From January to July 2025, the transaction area of residential land parcels in the key 30 cities reached 55.2 million square meters, a year-on-year increase of 17%, which is a sharp contrast with the 9% year-on-year decrease in the area of 300 cities nationwide. Although the market is still the current market, structural warming is taking place. In terms of the heat of land transactions, under the accelerated supply of prime land parcels in core cities, the proportion of premium land parcels and the average premium rate of premium land parcels have been climbing. In the first seven months, the proportion of premium land parcels in the 30 cities reached 30%, a new high in nearly three years, increasing by 12 percentage points compared to 2024, indicating that the sentiment for land acquisition has been stirred up. The average premium rate of premium land parcels has also increased rapidly, reaching 26% from January to July 2025, nearly doubling compared to the past two years. 02 Performance of companies is still divided But there are signs of a halt to the downward trend year by year Focusing on companies, overall performance is still very divided. Companies that have lost their investment functions will have a hard time recovering in the short term, and they also have "insufficient capacity" to seize opportunities for bargains. As of July, half of the top 100 real estate companies have not yet added new land reserves, but under the leadership of leading companies, investment amounts have shown positive growth. From January to July 2025, in terms of new land reserves, the total value and area of new reserves of the top 100 real estate companies reached 682.8 billion yuan and 58.02 million square meters, a 33% year-on-year increase in value, although the growth rate has narrowed slightly compared to the previous six months, the trend of continuous decline over the past four years has shown signs of stabilization. Although there was a 1.2% year-on-year decrease in area, it precisely reflects that current land acquisitions by companies are more focused on high-value and high-net-worth land parcels in core cities, which is consistent with the warming trend of land transactions in the aforementioned 30 cities. 03 Who is acquiring land? Top 10 land acquisition amount accounts for 70% of the top 100 Companies that are able to aggressively acquire land under the current cautious sentiment and high total prices in core cities are undoubtedly central SOEs and some well-established regional companies, and these companies are also the leading companies in the top 10 or even top 20 in sales. In the first seven months of 2025, the concentration of land acquisitions among the top 100 real estate companies remained high. The top 10 real estate companies accounted for 70% of the total new land acquisitions of the top 100, a slight decrease of 3 percentage points from the previous month, but an increase of 8 percentage points from the end of 2024, further concentrating the market landscape on leading companies. In terms of land acquisitions compared to sales, the top 10 real estate companies had a ratio of 0.41, far higher than the average of 0.3 for other echelons and industries, the answer is self-evident. Among the all-caliber top 10 sales, the strong ones continue to dominate. Companies like China Overseas Land & Investment, China Merchants Group, Greenland, and Jinmao saw their land acquisition amounts double in the first seven months, while companies like Poly Developments and Holdings Group and CHINA RES LAND, which had acquired more land in the past two years, continue to maintain a steady pace of investment, with year-on-year growth rates of 95% and 51% respectively, high-quality improvement land parcels are sufficient to support the future sales scale of these companies. 04 Who is acquiring high premium land? Jianfa, China Overseas Land & Investment, China Merchants Group, and Binjiang are frequent buyers Compared to the recovery in land acquisition activity, acquiring high premium land parcels can better reflect a company's determination to acquire land for inventory replenishment and its optimism about the city's fundamentals. National-level data may be somewhat distorted, under the strategic convergence of investment in first- and second-tier cities, the performance of companies in the 30 cities is more representative. According to CRIC statistics, in the core 30 cities, companies with more than 5 premium land acquisitions are mostly strong central SOEs and companies deeply rooted in Hangzhou like Binjiang, and the companies with the highest proportion of premium land acquisitions are Binjiang, Greenland, and CHINA RES LAND, with proportions of 100%, 84%, and 73% respectively. China Merchants Group, Jianfa, and Jinmao have proportions mainly below 40%. Furthermore, looking at the 30 cities, who is truly investing in high premium land parcels? According to the top 10 premium rate land parcels (in the 30 cities including residential land and land acquisition amount > 100 million yuan) in the first seven months, two land parcels with premium rates exceeding 100% were acquired by Jianfa Real Estate, located in Hangzhou and Chengdu, and compared to other second-tier cities, while Chengdu's market growth momentum has declined under the drive of core improvement projects, it is still better overall than most cities. In the top ten, it can be seen that China Overseas Land & Investment, Binjiang, and China Merchants each acquired two land parcels. In conclusion, the current focus of corporate investment is relatively consistent, all are using prime land parcels in first- and second-tier cities as investment strongholds, resulting in intense competition. The high total price has also discouraged some private and local SOEs, leaving central SOEs to dominate in these cities. The attractiveness of prime land parcels is gradually increasing, after all, the market has already certified that "improvement projects support half the sky".