Holdouts who refuse to sell their nail houses to developers (20 Pics)

Have you ever heard of the “nail houses”? Not many people in the United States have. Nail houses are the name that Chinese developers have given people who will not sell their houses to developers for demolition. Land development in China is proceeding at an extremely frantic pace to keep up with demand. Large amounts of land are torn up to make room for apartments and high rises every day all over China. Ancient villages that have been standing for thousands of years are torn down daily to feed the ever growing economic power that China has become. Most people will gladly take the money that is offered them and buy a new home and everything will be okay. However, there are more and more people who are saying enough is enough and refusing to sell their homes to big land developers. Whether nail houses in China are a problem will really depend on who you talk to. I’m sure the people who live in these homes would say they are just protecting what’s theirs, while developers are sure to say these people are simply being stubborn and stopping progress. No matter what side you are on, these incredible images of nail houses in China will leave you stunned.

I couldn’t imagine going home to a place like this. Zheng Meiju (pictured) has been living in this single slice of apartments since 2013 even though the water and power have been cut.

Apparently these people wanted some extra protection from developers and decided to go all medieval and build a moat.

Old houses in the middle of high rises like this can throw major problems into a big development project.

This lone house makes for such a sad picture amongst the more modern looking apartments rising all around it.

These few houses are the last remaining remnants of the over 900 year old Yangji Village. The whole project that was supposed to happen here was stopped because too many people held out.

According to a popular Chinese forum, this house was voted the coolest nail house in history.

This woman was utterly devastated and reduced to tears after her house was finally torn down.

It really would be interesting to find out how much money some of these developers have offered these people for these houses just to get them out of the way.

Only two houses remain from what was once an entire village on this piece of land. The residents were subject to attacks from anonymous sources that would randomly shut off their power and water.

I can’t imagine what it would be like to have the entire rest of the building you live in demolished around you.