Prepare for pop of property bubble

Signs have emerged that the curtain is falling on the decadelong golden period for China's real estate sector.

The average price of newly built homes in China's 70 major cities rose 8.7 percent year-on-year in February, slightly lower than the 9 percent growth in January, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics. Compared with 62 cities that saw a price increase in January, the number decreased to 57 in February and the margin of the average price increase declined from 1.2 percent month-on-month to 0.7 percent. The increase in the average house price in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, the four first-tier cities that witnessed a frenetic price increase last year, fell below 20 percent year-on-year.

Along with the slowing price increases is the drastic drop in home sales. In Beijing, only 2,221 new homes were sold in February, a record low since 2007. The February volume for sales of secondhand houses was 5,441, decreasing by 38 percent from January and 46.3 percent from a year earlier, a new low in 24 months.