China property: lived-in home sales rise but prices fall in Shenzhen, Beijing, Shanghai

Lived-in home sales in some of China’s largest cities are picking up, but prices remain subdued, with Japanese investment bank Nomura noting that the property crisis weighing on the economy for nearly four years is far from over.

In Shenzhen, a total of 2,390 second-hand homes changed hands last week, the most in more than three years, according to data compiled by the Shenzhen Real Estate Intermediary Association.

Similar trends have been observed in other major cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, where second-hand home transactions have increased in recent months.

However, lived-in home prices are a different story. In Shenzhen, prices have fallen by about 7 per cent in the first 11 months of the year, according to a price index from Centaline Property. The declines have been greater in Shanghai at about 10 per cent and more than 12 per cent in Beijing. At the same time, new home sales continue to decline.

“I think it’s a bit too early to conclude that China’s real estate sector as a whole has bottomed out and begun to rebound,” Lu Ting, chief China economist at Nomura, said on Wednesday.