April sales adding fuel to fears of property bubble

China's home sales fell 18 percent in April amid tighter credit, adding to signs of a slowdown in the world's second-largest economy.

The value of homes sold declined to 418 billion yuan ($67 billion) from 509 billion yuan in March, according to National Statistics Bureau data for the first four months of the year. The value of total sales from January to April fell 9.9 percent to 1.53 trillion yuan from a year earlier, the data showed.

China's broadest measure of new credit fell last month as authorities extended their campaign to tame a debt boom. New-home sales in 54 cities during the May 1-3 Labor Day holiday dropped 47 percent from a year earlier to 236,000 square meters, a four-year low, according to the Centaline Group real-estate agency.