China’s property market ‘springs back to life’ as Coronavirus crisis eases

There are signs that “the coronavirus crisis is abating” in China’s property market, reports the South China Post as residential sales in 30 major cities tripled from February to March.

Some 8.6 million square metres of property sold across the 30 cities in March – more than three times the 2.33 million sq m recorded in February, according to Wind Information.

This month’s transaction volumes in eight large cities – Shenzhen, Chengdu, Fuzhou, Hangzhou, Huaian, Yangzhou, Jiaxing, Shantou – have surpassed Q4 2019 average levels, according to China Real Estate Information Corporation.

“Prices of some new projects were capped [by the government], lower than the market price, so some projects are popular” with buyers, Yang Hongxu, deputy head of E-house China Research and Development Institute told the SCMP. “Restrictions on housing and land prices also created some room for arbitrage, so people are rushing to buy houses and property developers scramble to buy land.”

Guangdong-based developer Country Garden, for example, has re-opened 97% of its 1,327 sales centres (except in Hubei province), and resumed construction work at “almost all” of its 2,951 development sites.

“There’s a release of pent-up demand from the Spring Festival and the coronavirus lockdown period in February,” said Yang. “Thus we are seeing partial warming up of the property market.”

Pockets of urban activity are, however, unlikely to offset a nationwide decline in transactions this year.