How you can profit from Asia's property boom

In China, rural homes and paddy fields are rapidly giving way to roads and shopping centres. As real estate prices rise, we pick the best plays on Asian urbanisation.

In China, rural homes and paddy fields are rapidly giving way to roads, shopping centres and transmitting masts, while in other parts of the region, property supply has not kept up with foreign investment and job creation. Real estate prices are rising and there are profits to be made. Jody Clarke reports

Clinging precariously to the side of a 20-metre high mound of dirt, Wu Ping's two-storey house in the Chinese city of Chongqing was never going to pose much trouble for the wrecking team who'd come to level it. Sure enough, after a stand-off that lasted ten days and nights, by 10pm on 3 April it had made way for a new shopping centre and homes planned for the area. When the wrecking ball finally struck, Wu had already taken down the banner reading: "The legal property of citizens cannot be violated". China has embarked on a rapid period of urbanisation and nothing and no one will get in its way when it comes to moving 20 million people a year from the countryside to the cities.

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