Prices of new homes in China suffered their biggest fall in nearly a decade last month, in a sign that Beijing’s “historic” real estate rescue has not yet revived demand. Prices in 70 major cities were down 0.7% in May from April, National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) figures showed on Monday. That’s the steepest month-on-month drop since October 2014, according to Reuters calculation. According to separate calculations by the Macquarie Group, prices of existing homes in those cities fell by 7.5% year-on-year last month, marking the biggest decline on record.
A month ago, Beijing unveiled wide-ranging measures to rescue the crisis-hit property market, including asking local governments across the country to buy unsold homes from beleaguered developers and easing rules on purchases. “To be fair, one month is too short for the housing rescue package to take effect,” said analysts from Societe Generale on Monday.