That was my reaction too. Bit of a fluff piece. Here's an interesting link with some opinions from a commodities investor regarding China, and whether the ghost cities are a significant problem or not:

http://www.moneymorning.com.au/20110616/why-im-flying-the-fl...

He points out that China is urbanizing like mad (1 per cent a year) on top of 0.5 per cent population growth. At those rates, 50 million empty houses doesn't look so big. Whether there are other factors that prevent people taking up those apartments isn't clear though. Also I guess it depends on the financial situation of the developers. If there is a lot of leverage on those assets that are sitting idle and not being sold or generating income that must be hurting someone. Or perhaps the state owns them directly or indirectly, so ROI doesn't matter so much in the short term? I don't know.