Institutions, Urban Space, and Residential Markets in Globalizing Shanghai: A Comparative Study of Housing Sale and Rental Prices

Wei, Y. D., Wu, Y., & Li, H.

Journal of Urban Affairs · 2025

Publisher Google Scholar

Contribution

By comparing housing sales and rents within one framework, the study extends price explanations beyond dwelling attributes and location to globalization, institutions and metropolitan spatial structure. Buyers and renters face different opportunities and constraints, making tenure an important dimension of urban inequality and residential segregation rather than treating the housing market as uniform.

Findings and approach

  • In Shanghai, renters place relatively greater emphasis on employment opportunities and buyers on service amenities; neither group is assumed to have exclusive preferences.
  • Institutional and globalizing contexts help explain the concentration of opportunities and services in central areas and unequal residential outcomes; suburbs appear relatively more inclusive.
  • The framework connects global, metropolitan and local contexts. Proxy variables and quantitative data do not fully capture globalization or the processes of social exclusion.
Within a shared global, institutional and urban context, buyers place greater emphasis on service amenities and renters on job opportunities. The comparison treats tenure as a dimension of urban inequality, not as an absolute division of preferences.
Conceptual illustration, not an empirical map or statistical plot.