Happy Halloween! To celebrate the scariest day of the year, we thought we would talk about the US election…but you know, from a real estate perspective. A survey conducted by Juwai, shows that people in China are as divided as Americans when it comes to the polls.

Looking to gauge the impact of the US election on real estate, the survey polled real estate professionals and Chinese buyers. The interesting thing is the groups had very differing opinions. Real estate professionals selling overseas feel that Donald Trump is better for business. While the actual investors from China felt that Hillary Clinton will benefit them.

Real Estate Under Trump

The majority of real estate professionals selling to China felt “The Donald” would be beneficial to investment. 55% of the group believed he would create policies to help Chinese investors. 54% of respondents felt that this would increase the amount of investment to the US. Probably because, you know…he’s a real estate developer.

What about the anti-China, pro-taxation statements we’ve been hearing from Trump? “While Trump has made many anti-China statements, and promised to tax Chinese goods, most Chinese observers feel that with him there are no ideologies, only interests, and interests can be negotiated” said Matthew Moore, Juwai’s President of The Americas.

Real Estate Under Clinton

Despite the majority of agents being pro-Trump, Chinese real estate investors prefer Hillary. 54% of investors believe Clinton will implement policies to benefit Chinese investors. Although only 40% were confident that investment will increase under her. 29% of investors felt it would make no difference at all.

According to Moore, “most Chinese think Clinton would be a continuation of Obama’s two terms.They like that she is consistent and predictable, even when they don’t agree with her. They don’t like that she criticizes China on human rights, nor that she believes America should stand up to China in the Pacific.” So…they don’t like Hillary’s politics, they just think she would be better for investments. Weird.

Social Preference Influenced Business Preference

The strangest question on the survey was “who would you rather have dinner with?” Once again, Chinese investors and the people selling property disagreed. The majority of real estate professionals (62%), would prefer to have dinner with the Donald. Only 38% of them would like to have dinner with Hillary.

Chinese investors were a little more split on this issue. The majority (54%) would prefer to have dinner with Hillary. Only 46% of investors would prefer to have dinner with Donald. While that still indicates a majority preference, the gap wasn’t as wide as with agents.

This last question had me scratching my head until I realized how much context it provides. It seems like participants believe the person they like is also good for business. This could mean they would like to have dinner with the person that makes them the most money. It could also mean they have no clue how it’ll impact investment. They’re just picking the person they like. I’m not a gambling man, but the latter seems like the horse I would go with.

Data courtesy of Juwai.com. Photo via Mike Maguire.

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