Study on the Arrangement of Control Rights for Public Rental Housing PPP Projects: A Simulation Evolution Analysis

The public–private partnership (PPP) is one of the important ways of public rental housing construction and operation. The arrangement of control rights has a significant impact on whether a public rental housing PPP project can be launched successfully and project performance. This paper aims to explore how control rights should be arranged between government and private capital in public rental housing PPP projects based on China’s experience. In this study, the control rights arrangement status of public rental housing PPP projects divides into two types: strong mode and standard mode. A cost–benefit decision model is established for control rights arrangements. We simulate control rights evolution through variable changes. Comparative analysis examines both models’ scenarios. This paper shows that the standard mode should be chosen when private capital has a stronger operating capacity and the unit private benefits of control rights are low. Conversely, the strong mode is a better choice. The proportion of private capital's control rights is negatively correlated with supervision and effort costs and has a nonlinear inverted U-shaped relationship with private capital’s operating capacity and private benefits of control rights. When the control rights of private capital are within a certain range, the increase of private capital control rights can bring about the improvement of project revenue. When the proportion of private capital control rights exceeds the threshold, it will lead to the decrease of project revenue.