Prices of new homes across China’s biggest cities fell in September, the first month-on-month decline since April 2015 and a sign that sustained weakness across the country’s real estate industry was feeding through into the property market.
Data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed new home prices dropped in more than half of the 70 cities it surveyed compared with August. Goldman Sachs’ analysis of the figures found a 0.5 per cent decline in prices on an annualised basis after including seasonal adjustments.
The data will add to pressure on policymakers, who have sought to cool the country’s vast real estate sector but are confronting rising defaults and slower activity across a sector that has anchored economic growth for years.