Beijing's second-hand home sales set record

Night view of skyscrapers and high-rise buildings of Jianwai Soho and Yintai Center in CBD in Beijing. [Photo/IC]

As of Dec 26, second-hand home transactions in Beijing has reached 267,900 units, five days before 2016 ends, breaking the record of 266,900 units set in 2009, Beijing Business Today reported on Thursday.

This year also marks the second year in Beijing's history that full-year second-hand home transactions exceeded 200,000 units.

Figures show that second-hand home sales have accounted for 85 percent of Beijing's commercial residential buildings market, compared with about 70 percent in previous years.

This shows Beijing has fully entered an era in which the city is seeing much more trading in second-hand homes than new properties, the newspaper said.

Average new home prices in Beijing rose 26.4 percent in November from last year, slowing for the second month following cooling measures taken by the government in late September.

Against this backdrop, land supply for traditional commercial residential buildings has been reduced, and as a result, developers put more interest in non-residential land, Centaline Property chief analyst Zhang Dawei said.

Second-hand home sales will continuously dominate in the property market, Zhang added.

In Shanghai, new home sales also saw a decline this year, while the proportion of second-hand home transactions is close to 80 percent.

However, Beijing's second-hand home market still cannot escape the overall trend of a cooling market in the short term, the newspaper said.

At the Central Economic Work Conference, the government called for measures to build a market-oriented and long-term mechanism to curtail the property bubble and prevent instability in the market.

The domestic property market will face tight policies in the year ahead, Hu Jinghui, vice-president of private consultancy Bacic & 5i5j said.

The possibility and room for loose policies in Beijing, as a barometer of the domestic property market, is very small, Hu said, adding that he did not rule out the possibility of tightening rules further.

A top Beijing official earlier vowed to reinforce restrictive measures in the capital's real estate market to ensure steady home prices next year.

"Residential homes have been already overpriced, piling on risks and adding to social anxiety. It challenges the city's sustainable development and stability," said Guo Jinlong, Party chief of Beijing.