Sinohydro Real Estate, a subsidiary of government-owned Sinohydro Group Ltd, announced last Thursday an investment of 8 billion yuan ($970 million) in a housing project for seniors in Chongqing.

It came after Sinopec's Sichuan branch invested a similar amount in a senior housing project in Chengdu last month.

But analysts have cast doubt on the enthusiasm for senior housing projects and whether it will deliver profits for these companies.

Chen Baocun, a property market specialist, said many developers enter the senior housing market just to get land. In practice, many projects were actually developed into tourism properties. Senior housing is just a name, Chen said.

Li Ming, president of Sino-Ocean Land, a developer, said that the common practice for developers is to sell the property in a one-off deal while globally developers of such projects make their profits in maintenance fees.