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Housing prices in China have risen dramatically in recent decades, giving rise to bubble concerns. Many studies show that shortterm regulation of real estate market is ineffective, which drove central government to propose the construction of a long-term mechanism for real estate in late 2016. However, few studies have been conducted to estimate its effects. This article highlights the effects of the long-term mechanism on housing prices, similar to a quasi-natural experiment, with the proposal of the long-term mechanism. In this context, the study was conducted with the end of 2016 as a breakpoint, using the RDiT method and panel data for 35 large- and medium-sized cities from 2009 to 2021, to find out whether the long-term mechanism has stabilized housing prices or not. The results reveal that the long-term mechanism dramatically reduced the divergence and dispersion of housing prices from the long-term equilibrium level. Further study shows that there is significant heterogeneity in the impact of the longterm mechanism on housing prices across cities, with significant effects in second-tier cities but not in first-tier cities, and with significant effects in central and western cities but not in eastern cities. Therefore, we suggest that the eastern, including the first-tier cities, remain the focus of the construction of the long-term mechanism in the future, and continue to implement short-term regulation for key cities, and build a system that coordinates with the long-term mechanism.