BEIJING, April 3 (Reuters) - China's new home sales rose
sharply in March, as a slew of support policies boosted a pickup
in demand across the board in 14 surveyed cities, a private
survey showed on Monday.
The sales of new homes rose 55.7% month-on-month, up from
growth of 31.9% in February, according to data from the China
Index Academy — one of the country's largest independent real
estate researchers.
Tier-one cities — including the nation's capital Beijing and
the commercial hub of Shanghai — rose the fastest, jumping 73%
last month. Sales in tier-two cities and tier-three cities grew
54.7% and 28.6%, respectively.
The data will be welcome news for the sector, once the
pillar of China's economic growth, but which was crushed by
several crises since mid-2021, including developers' debt
defaults and stalled construction of pre-sold housing projects.
Policymakers in the country had introduced a comprehensive
bailout package at the end of last year to propel sales and
enable project completions, which helped improve the sentiment.
Real estate developers gained 2.4% on Monday. The industry has also seen some gradual recovery in recent
weeks, as homebuyers look to make a return after Beijing
abandoned its stringent "zero-COVID" policy in December.
Local governments, too, continued to ease property curbs or
roll out stimulus polices to improve buyers' sentiment. The
southeastern city of Xiamen relaxed home-buying curbs, allowing
more residents to purchase properties.
Prices of new homes in 100 Chinese cities rose at the
fastest pace in nine months in March, a separate survey by the
researcher showed on Saturday.
(Reporting by Liangping Gao and Ryan Woo; editing by Uttaresh
Venkateshwaran)
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