OSAKA -- The financially strapped Osaka Prefectural Government will sell off all of its 1,185 employee housing units and its seaside resort in a bid to raise cash and narrow its gaping budget deficit, sources said Thursday.

The prefecture, on the verge of being declared an "organization for fiscal reconstruction" -- the equivalent to a private company filing for bankruptcy -- hopes to raise several billion yen by selling the land and apartment buildings, where monthly rent is just 15,000 yen for the largest units and a mere 1,500 yen for the smallest.

All current occupants will have to vacate by fiscal 2004.