Any City Guides, Especially if It Might Be a Summer Home?

Hi Everyone,

Briefly, before COVID started, I lived in Xianghe, Hebei, near Beijing.

1. The person who is now my wife insisted I buy an apartment that was being built. According to her analysis, it was a decent deal. I signed a contract.

2. With COVID, they stopped building. We hired a lawyer, and got them to start building again.

I think we had our choice of getting our money back, or continuing to build it. We chose to build it.

3. It still is not finished. It will probably take 12-18 months more.

She is convinced it is not one of the tens of millions of apartments that only exist on pieces of paper. We have seen construction of the buildings. Rather, it has just been slow.

4. If this happened in the US, I would use "City Guides" etc. to find crucial information, such as:

a. Long-term plans to build a subway, train connections to Beijing, or total annexation to Beijing
b. Local guides for local entertainment, gyms, fun things to do
c. Possible employers, etc.
d. Schools for children

5. I did live in that area for a good six months. It feels like a distant suburb, of a distant suburb, of Beijing.

So, if I had to teach English and live there, I could do so. I could also go to the gym, meet people, etc.

Rather, I want to make the most of it.

6. I would prefer a city guide to see what this Xianghe districts plan are. At very best, it will one day be a part of Beijing, with a subway taking me from there to Beijing city center within two hours.

7. Any resources to find out more about living in this Xianghe (near Furniture City) place?

It's probably worth digging up the main information number for Xianghe.  Someone there should be able to at least get you started looking in the right direction.  If that fails, somewhere there's a building for the county government as well as the government of the township.  A friendly inquiry at the front desk might get you to the correct department.

1. Thank you.

I commend this forum. For 10+ years, I have never seen any flaming or junk answers, like the famous Dave's ESL Cafe.

2. I can at least ask my wife to do that, in Chinese.

3. I do feel like a sucker. The salesman told my wife and I that Xianghe would one day be part of the Beijing district, there would be subways nearby, and high-speed rail into Beijing (cf. Tianjin to Beijing).

But, I think those are not true.

Never trust someone who has a financial interest in providing incorrect info.  For example, one time we'd just arrived in a town and couldn't find our hotel.  My wife asked the clerk at a different hotel.  That person immediately sent us in the wrong direction - most likely in hope of us giving up and possibly checking into the hotel the clerk worked for.  Asking a convenience store clerk (who has no motive to send a person away from a booked hotel room) would have been more likely to get us correct info.  (Now we'd just let the phone guide us to the hotel, but this was before smartphone navigation was common.)

Hopefully, your area really is on some planned expansion map and someone from township or county level can provide information about realistic timelines for subways, express trains, etc. to be installed.

Is there any official site for: Xianghe Special Administration District, Langfang, Hebei?

It is right across the street from a Furniture City. So, there is some need for big transportation nearby.

Most government agencies have websites.  National and provincial ones are easy to find.  Local ones may be easy or may take some digging.  If you know where it is and have a reason to be in the area, swinging by and asking might be faster than hunting on Baidu.