The government will offer 4,000 affordable housing units for sale near the projected Linkuo station of the Taipei Mass Rapid Transit system in 2013, with low income families who do not already own property given purchasing preference, a Ministry of the Interior official said Thursday. Yeh Shih-wen, director of the ministry's Construction and Planning Agency, said the government will use approximately 226 hectares of reserved land and farmland around the projected MRT station to build the housing, with each unit price kept as low as NT$150,000 per ping (3.3 square meters). While housing prices in Taipei City and some locations in Taipei County have been skyrocketing over the past few years, a survey report released by the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission under the Cabinet last December indicated that high housing prices in the city topped the list of public complaints. To help the payroll class live in their own apartments, the government therefore decided to build affordable housing units with traffic convenience. The 4,000 units at Linkuo are expected to be completed in 2013, when an extension of the MRT system to Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport is completed. According to Yeh, the travel time from Linkuo to the MRT's Taipei Main Station stop will be around 30 minutes. He said more affordable housing units are planned along the line and added that the government is also planning to build public housing units on the outskirts of Tamsui township in Taipei County when a light rail system is built to serve the area. 