New home sales continue pace for first seven months

Sales of new homes continued to gain momentum in the first seven months of this year, data released today by the National Bureau of Statistics showed.

About 6.63 trillion yuan (US$961.5 billion) worth of new homes, excluding government-subsidized affordable housing, were sold between January and July nationwide, a year-on-year rise of 16.2 percent, the bureau said in a statement posted on its website. The growth rate accelerated from the 14.2 percent increase in the first half and the 12.8 percent expansion of the first five months.

The area of new homes sold in the first seven months climbed 4.2 percent from the same period a year earlier to 780.46 million square meters, picking up as well from the 3.2 percent growth in the first half and the 2.3 percent increase registered in the first five months.

"Despite the fact that July is a traditional low season for property sales, mainly because of the hot weather, real estate developers around the country were all geared up to unload their inventories as financing costs remain high, while no signs of policy loosening can be expected anytime soon,” Lu Wenxi, senior manager of research at Shanghai Centaline Property Consultants Co said.

The inventory of new homes continued to shrink. Newly-built homes available for sale as of the end of July fell 21.4 percent from the same time a year ago, to around 268.69 million square meters, the bureau’s data showed. That compared with 274.14 million square meters recorded as of the end of June, and 280.56 million square meters registered as of the end of May.

Investment in residential property development, which took up 70.5 percent of total real estate investment in the first seven months, rose 14.2 percent year on year to 4.64 trillion yuan, accelerating from the 13.6 percent growth recorded in the first six months, according to the bureau.