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News & Current Events Mar 31, 2026 at 10:48 AM

Chinese banned from buying flats for dead relatives’ ashes

Posted by TheTelegraph

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kinetic_honda Mar 31, 2026 +579
Funeral costs are half a years average salary, while apartment prices have gone down 40% The new flex from rich people will be buying a burial plot and living in that.
579
rosen380 Mar 31, 2026 +158
Google says that 1br outside of the city center of Beijing is around 3800 yuan per month and the high end for a funeral in Beijing is around 12,000. While 3800 is in fact less than 12000 (I checked!), 3800/mo would seem to catch up somewhat quickly.
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10001110101balls Mar 31, 2026 +84
One could fit a lot of urns into to an apartment though. With the inverted population pyramid (4 grandparents -> 1 grandchild) there are going to be many people with a surplus of dead relatives.
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joelfarris Mar 31, 2026 +4
Surplus Relatives? I loved that movie!
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PreciousTC Mar 31, 2026 +45
Google is wrong then. I live in China and spend 3800 rambos on food alone in Beijing. Unless "outside of city center" is something f****** stupid like Tianjing whicj is like calling Yonkers "outside of the city center" when referencing Manhattan I call major BS.
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rosen380 Mar 31, 2026 +8
So are you saying the 3800 is too low? If so, that just means that rent catches up to funeral costs even quicker.
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PreciousTC Mar 31, 2026 +16
I've never been to a funeral in BJ, but where I am around 8 hours a way it was maybe 15k, max. We buried our relative in a village as well, which allowed us an actual tomb. The vast majority of Chinese don't get that. You get cremation and ashes if you wish, which is cheaper. Rent in BJ even outside of city center but still in actual Beijing should be around 7-10k
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Perona2Bear2Order2 Mar 31, 2026 +8
So what are they going to do, prevent future conversions, or make old ones go away too? If the latter, where will all the urns go?
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PreciousTC Mar 31, 2026 +12
To my knowledge the central government doesn't even allow new graveyards / cemeteries to be built. The one my wife and I use for her family is already half-demolished and theyre only allowing urns to be placed in plots that are grandfathered in. The ones not being destroyed are those who have no further living immediate relatives.
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Chamrox Mar 31, 2026 +12
They're buying the apartment, not renting it. I'm assuming no utilites like water/electric/etc to add to the costs. Unsure if china has a property tax. if you have a large family, you could stack a lot of urns in there.
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SardScroll Mar 31, 2026 +5
Technically, one cannot buy land in China, as I understand it. Merely a 99 year lease.
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Chamrox Mar 31, 2026 +1
Didn't know that. Well then.
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Trappist1 Mar 31, 2026 +8
This is technically true, but everyone treats it as ownership. The CCP would cease to exist within a week if they actually started to reclaim properties. 
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welkover Mar 31, 2026 +6
They are hoping burial plot prices will come down, then they can move the ashes there and sell the apartment. These aren't being purchased with the intent that they be used for ashes forever, even if Chinese social media presents it that way because that's a weirder story.
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BulkyCoat8893 Mar 31, 2026 +5
I think its more than that though the [Qingming Festival](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qingming_Festival) or Tomb Sweeping day is a national holiday - its next Sunday. "During Qingming, Chinese families visit the tombs of their ancestors to clean the gravesites and make ritual offerings to their ancestors." Having a place for your families remains seems to be a big part of the culture.
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SomeOneOverHereNow Mar 31, 2026 -1
yeah, but they can sublet.
-1
TheTelegraph Mar 31, 2026 +133
***The Telegraph reports:*** China has banned people from storing dead family members’ ashes in empty high-rise flats. The practice, known as “bone-ash apartments”, has become increasingly popular in recent years as a rapidly ageing population – and growing death rate – leads to climbing costs of cemetery plots and columbariums. However, regulations that came into force on Monday have banned the “use of residential dwellings specifically for the interment of ashes”. China’s population is ageing at one of the fastest rates in history and outpacing the number of births, meaning the cost of funerals and grave plots has soared. In 2020, the price of a funeral was almost half the country’s average annual salary, according to a survey by the British insurance firm SunLife. Meanwhile, apartment costs have dropped by almost 40 per cent in the past five years as consumer confidence remains low and a long-running property sector crisis lingers, making them a far more desirable investment to honour the dead. In China, many people choose to keep family remains in a designated location outside the home where they can follow rituals to honour the dead. The “bone ash” apartments are used as a ritual hall instead of cemeteries. They are often identifiable by sealed-off windows or closed curtains, according to Chinese media reports. **Full story:** [**https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/03/31/chinese-banned-from-buying-flats-for-dead-relatives/?WT.mc\_id=tmgoff\_listnook\_buying-flats-for-dead-relatives/&accesscontrol=facebookchannel\_open**](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/03/31/chinese-banned-from-buying-flats-for-dead-relatives/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_listnook_buying-flats-for-dead-relatives/&accesscontrol=facebookchannel_open)
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aethelberga Mar 31, 2026 +78
>"However, regulations that came into force on Monday have banned the “use of residential dwellings specifically for the interment of ashes”. Aren't they just going to say that the condo isn't for granny's ashes and is instead for their college age child to live in while studying? Short of forcing their way into all apartments looking for signs of current habitation (though, this is China, I guess), what can the government do?
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nichtich2 Mar 31, 2026 +66
That will stop them from decorating the apartment like it's a tomb. Neighbours won't know, so it won't hurt fengshui in their mind. So it won't drag down property value, which is the real reason/problem here.
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Careful-Calendar8922 Mar 31, 2026 +20
They know if housing is being used based on the utility usage and it being China, they can confiscate the property that’s being used illegally. But also you register your Hukou (family registration) by law when you move into a new neighborhood. That determines the places you go for healthcare, school, etc. You can only be registered in one place at a time, so you can’t just say you are living somewhere. 
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Lopsided_Ad3516 Mar 31, 2026 +13
Ah, I see you're familiar with the Snowwashing model.
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MiaowaraShiro Mar 31, 2026 +10
Proactive solution: High rise mausoleums.
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Ahelex Mar 31, 2026 +10
As I like to call it: Inverse French catacombs.
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EngineeringDevil Mar 31, 2026 +6
POKEMON TOWER LETS GOOOOO!!!
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peterpan764 Mar 31, 2026 +18
We compare to peak Covid funeral prices? I don’t think 2020 is a good year to use here.
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clarksa0 Mar 31, 2026 +5
Do you want ghosts? Because this is how you get ghosts.
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ataylorm Mar 31, 2026 +23
New business, I open a warehouse, fill it with urns, create some “memory” rooms. You schedule a time, go to your assigned room, enter a code, ashes are robotically pulled and delivered. Screens show pictures. AI pretends to be them. You have a nice chat…. Thank you come again next month. Now I’m serving people only using a tiny amount of storage space.
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cwthree Mar 31, 2026 +3
>Now I’m serving people "...And we'll serve anyone - meaning _anyone_ - and to anyone, at aaaaaallll!"
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Street_Relief_9680 Apr 1, 2026 +1
Can we store trump there? He might not be quite dead yet, but he is dead inside
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Realistic-Nobody-750 Mar 31, 2026 +17
I mean I f*** with the sentiment ngl. But yeah that’s crazy.
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cutiefoodie Mar 31, 2026 +16
Ghost cities are earning their title hehe
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falilth Mar 31, 2026 +3
Between this and banning funeral strippers whats even the point anymore.
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Rashaverak420 Apr 1, 2026 +5
What the dystopian f*** did I just read.
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[deleted] Mar 31, 2026 +8
[deleted]
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DrSpaceman575 Mar 31, 2026 +7
How is that similar? The people who live on cruise ships are alive.
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[deleted] Mar 31, 2026 +3
[deleted]
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indigo121 Mar 31, 2026
You should probably specify in what capacity you think things are equivalent, I do not think your point was initially obvious
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lmBatman Mar 31, 2026 +2
This can’t be a thing. Chinese apartments aren’t that c****. I’m going to be paying for mine for the next 28 years 😭
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telapo Mar 31, 2026 +3
From what I read, it's not c****, but cheaper than a tomb in a cemetery and that’s before factoring miscellaneous fees like maintenance etc. Leases on apartments are also longer than cemeteries, something like e.g 70 yrs vs 20 yrs ish in shanghai.
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lmBatman Mar 31, 2026 +3
There’s no way that it’s going to be cheaper than a cemetery, if you’re looking at any major city. Even though apartment prices are dropping somewhat, they’re still ludicrous. Our <100 sqm apartment (two bedroom) in Suzhou cost over 3.3 million Cny and that was just about two years ago. And not even in the center of town
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telapo Apr 1, 2026 +1
I think they're comparing value per sqm and buying apartments in lower level cities. I'm reading a 2024 Guangzhou Daily article where they interviewed this lady from Beijing. She mentioned 100k yuan for a small local plot with maintenance fees and 20 yr lease, so she bought an adequate sized apartment in Zhangjiakou, 250k, 70 yr lease.
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gclancy51 Mar 31, 2026 +1
How can this be stopped? Will there be a question on some form? Why not just tick "no?"
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Skythewood Apr 1, 2026 +2
If your neighbours don't complain, then no problem. If you are going to hold rites and put up decor to emphasize on the this place is specifically for ashes internment thing, then you will get into trouble.
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BoggleWithAStick Mar 31, 2026 +1
Probably not on a personal level but with the right amount of surveillance footage you would get flagged for a check if you are stupid and you let people come and hand you their urn with ashes after the funeral service. I think a pattern recognition/AI systems applied to footage can just detect patterns that would mark some flats as potentionally storage units for ashes rather than normal use.
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Icy-Computer-Poop Apr 1, 2026 +1
Mirror: https://archive.is/Ltanc
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Fact-Rat Mar 31, 2026 -17
Seems like a common sense approach. All hail communism.
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BrutalN00dle Mar 31, 2026
Quick, do the cost of a full casket and funeral in the USA/UK/Aus/etc vs median income!
0
havartifunk Mar 31, 2026 +7
Google says about a quarter of median annual salary in my state.  Still way too damn high.
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BrutalN00dle Mar 31, 2026 +2
We are all victims of capitalism. It does not matter to the capitalist where their profit comes from, so long as it continues to come to them. Profiteering off of funeral ritual is just another of the excesses of the capitalist system.                   I presume that the account I responded to is a simple troll account, if not, the commenter is desperately close to class consciousness and may just need another shove into caring for his brother and sisters of the world. 
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Lopsided_Ad3516 Mar 31, 2026 -8
Where there's demand, supply will meet it. You're not a victim of capitalism.
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BrutalN00dle Mar 31, 2026 +8
Then why is there hunger in America? Shouldn't the supply meet the demand? And then the surplus that sits on the shelves should lower in price, right? Surely the capitalist grocers in America wouldn't just throw good food away!?        In fact, how are your local grocery and gas prices? Have you felt victimized recently by the capitalist war of arrogance in Iran? The capitalists trading in defense stocks and oil futures sure made out nicely.                     Or is the rampant hunger and inequality due to the capitalists who profit off of its artifical scarcity?                                              Do you think that the capitalists running the USA, for example, are motivated in any capacity to reduce inequality? Or are they actively stripping workers protections like OSHA, disbanding of the NLRB, and repealing child labor laws? Is the loss of my political power, at the direct hands of the capitalist, not an act of political subjugation? Is my agency as a laborer not lessened by these capitalist efforts?                 Edit: it's been nearly an hour since your comment, and i note that you have not supplied answers in response to my demand. Is it because it isn't profitable for you to do so, despite the acute social economy we have established between us? Just cosplay capitalism from you huh?
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[deleted] Mar 31, 2026
[deleted]
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localfern Mar 31, 2026
Okay no AirBnB
0
Nolsoth Mar 31, 2026 -5
Kinda wasteful, but also pragmatic in a way.
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TotallyInOverMyHead Mar 31, 2026 -1
Querry, will this be the thing that crashes the Chinese real estate market ?
-1
FreeKony2016 Mar 31, 2026 -5
But at what cost?
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