0.5 yuan/m2 property fee causes the community to fall into a "cyclical lawsuit"

This article is reproduced from: Peninsula Morning News

A property management fee of 0.5 yuan per sq. m. traps the residential community in “a cycle of lawsuits”

After multi-party collaborative mediation, the property made rectifications; the voluntary payment rate rose from 60% to 90%

安居乐业 is the most basic aspiration of the people. Property services are tied to people’s sense of happiness and fulfillment. Just after this year’s Spring Festival, a property company in Dalian filed a lawsuit at the High-tech Zone Court against 31 homeowners to recover overdue fees. The homeowners promptly filed a counterclaim, demanding service improvements. In recent years, disputes over property services have been on the rise. In some residential communities, conflicts between homeowners and property companies have intensified, becoming a “thorn in the flesh” for grassroots governance. In July 2025, the People’s Court of the Dalian High-tech Industrial Park, together with the Dalian Property Management Association and the High-tech Zone housing and urban-rural development bureau, jointly signed the “Cooperation Agreement on Integrated Resolution of Property Service Disputes,” exploring a new path for source-level dispute governance through diversified participation and coordinated linkage. It is this multi-party coordination that has helped the property dispute escape the predicament of “a cycle of lawsuits,” achieving a shift from “standing in court” to “co-governance for peaceful living.”

The predicament: intertwined difficulty in collecting fees and poor service — the community falls into a “double-loss” situation

A certain residential community in Dalian’s High-tech Zone was built in 2000 and has nearly 1,600 homeowners. Homeowners who are seniors account for more than half, and there are also a certain number of tenants. Starting in May 2019, a property company moved in and began providing services. The property fee standard was 0.5 yuan per square meter, with an actual collection rate of 60%. Some homeowners have been in long-term arrears since 2020.

The property company said it was struggling due to a shortage of funds and bluntly stated, “Even paying staff wages is difficult, let alone improving service quality”; homeowners, meanwhile, complained that “the service can’t keep up; all they do is focus on collecting fees all day.” Just after the Spring Festival in 2026, the property company filed a lawsuit at the High-tech Zone Court against 31 homeowners to recover overdue fees. The homeowners immediately filed a counterclaim, demanding service rectifications. Both sides fell into a vicious cycle of “poor service — difficulty collecting fees — even worse service.”

The intervention: justice with warmth — find the root cause through “comprehensive screening”

After accepting the case, the High-tech Zone Court did not handle it in a purely case-by-case manner. Instead, it quickly launched a mechanism for integrated resolution of property disputes. Judges and mediators from the People’s Mediation Committee for Property Disputes in Dalian jointly carried out preliminary mediation. Given the community’s high proportion of senior homeowners, the approach of “comprehensive screening” was adopted: patiently listening to the demands of every homeowner, carefully recording their opinions, and sorting out three major common issues. Inadequate sanitation in stairwells, with clutter piled up affecting passage and fire safety; chaotic management of parking lots, with outside vehicles occupying spaces and blocking fire lanes; and poor sanitation in outdoor common areas, where pet waste affects residents’ living experience.

Through listening and communication, the judges and mediators gradually won the trust of the homeowners, laying a solid foundation for resolving the disputes that followed.

Breaking the deadlock: coordination between industry self-discipline and administrative oversight — driving rectifications to be effective in practice

Once the root cause was identified, the Dalian Property Management Association and the District housing and urban-rural development bureau stepped in promptly. They worked in parallel from two dimensions—industry self-discipline and administrative regulation—guiding the property company to face its service shortcomings squarely and proactively respond to reasonable demands from homeowners. With supervision, coordination, and suggestions from multiple parties, the property company quickly advanced the rectifications. It coordinated with the community to carry out a comprehensive cleanup of public areas and stairwells, and established a long-term mechanism for regular cleaning. It installed and activated an automatic vehicle identification system to strictly control outside vehicles, effectively alleviating the homeowners’ parking difficulties. It set up signage to encourage civilized dog ownership and added outdoor trash bins, guiding homeowners to voluntarily maintain the public environment.

After a month of focused rectification, the overall level of the community’s property services improved significantly. With the 0.5 yuan per sq. m. fee standard, the property provided a service quality that exceeded expectations. Homeowners’ attitudes changed noticeably. As of now, among the 31 disputes, 19 have been successfully mediated, with a mediation success rate of 61%; the remaining disputes are also being resolved in an orderly manner. The community’s voluntary property fee payment rate rose sharply from 60% to 90%. What used to be “confrontation” is moving toward “mutual trust.”

The new development: institutional empowerment for diversified co-governance — drawing a “circle of common heart” for grassroots governance

Nothing is small when it comes to the interests of the people; community property matters concern thousands of households. The shift from “standing in court” to “co-governance for peaceful living” tests the judicial responsibility of “treating others’ cases as one’s own,” and it verifies the governance effectiveness of diversified coordination. In July 2025, the Dalian Intermediate People’s Court, the Municipal Bureau of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, the Municipal Committee’s Office for Social Work, and the Municipal Justice Bureau jointly issued the “Task List and Responsible Departments for Promoting the Resolution of Contradictions and Disputes in the Property Service Sector in Dalian.” From 12 areas, including improving the credit evaluation system for property service enterprises, standardizing the exit mechanism, promoting public disclosure of fee information, opening complaint and举报 reporting channels, establishing and improving a four-level people’s mediation mechanism, and adjudicating property fee breach-of-contract cases in accordance with law and regulations, it systematically built an institutional framework for source-level governance of property disputes and diversified dispute resolution.

Governance is built on institutions; coordination is the key; and people’s well-being is the foundation. Dalian’s experience shows that when multiple forces—judicial, administrative, industry, community, and others—form a synergy, property disputes can definitely escape the predicament of “a cycle of lawsuits,” truly achieving the shift from “standing in court” to “co-governance for peaceful living,” so that the people can feel fairness and justice and the warmth of governance “right at their doorstep.”

Song Yujiao

Peninsula Morning News, 39°C Video

Reporter Yue Yuyan