Top 10 Real Estate Headlines from Asia Pacific The Tax Office has issued a new Margin Scheme Legislative Determination that generally applies from 1 March 2010. Prospective buyers of new apartment developments in Hong Kong are often misled by artists’ impressions of grand clubhouses, photos of unobstructed sea views or lush greeneries appearing in sales brochures even though the development sites are actually located near public residential housing, landfill sites or sewage treatment plants. The Western Australia Court of Appeal (by majority) has held that a subcontractor, whose supply contract had a retention of title (“ROT”) clause and who supplied materials to the owner of a property, by reason of a contract with the builder, did not have a caveatable interest over the land. When one looks at the current huzzle and buzzle around privatization of infrastructure in India, it is difficult to imagine that just about six years back, privatization was virtually unknown in India. The story started with the Road sector in the late 1990’s but that too initially was not under the BOT Model. The project was funded by the Government through a 1% cess on diesel. In February 2010 the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) will be disbanded and replaced by a new independent building and construction division in the Office of the Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO). Home-buyers in Hong Kong have for the longest time been shortchanged in the actual living space of apartments they bought, ascommon areas of housing development here until recently have beenincluded in the calculation of the size of apartments for sale. The construction industry in China has grown side by side with the Chinese economy, and the recent RMB 4 trillion (US$593 billion) government stimulus package has helped to fuel this growth in construction and infrastructure development. With China's continuing economic development, an increasing number of foreign companies wish to participate in the Chinese construction market, and a considerable number of foreign companies are in fact engaged in construction and design activities in China. A summary of the various state and territory budgets, and the abolition of the remaining duties follows. Since 1844, land transactions in Hong Kong have been operating on a deeds registration system governed by the Land Registration Ordinance (Cap.128). | 
