China property investment down 7.4% in January-August

BEIJING -- China's investment in property development went down 7.4 percent year-on-year in the first eight months of 2022, widening by 1 percentage point from that in the first seven months, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed Friday.

Total property investment in this period stood at 9.08 trillion yuan ($1.31 trillion), the NBS said.

Investment in residential buildings came in at 6.89 trillion yuan, down 6.9 percent year-on-year.

Commercial housing sales in terms of floor area totaled 878.9 million square meters, down 23 percent year-on-year, but the decline rate narrowed 0.1 percentage points from that in the first seven months. In terms of value, sales fell 27.9 percent to 8.59 trillion yuan, narrowing 0.9 percentage points compared with the first seven months.

The property development climate index, compiled by the NBS, came in at 95.07 points in August.

China's home prices in 70 large and medium-sized cities eased in August, with more cities seeing a decline in home prices.

In August, 50 out of the 70 cities saw a month-on-month drop in new home sales prices, up from 40 in July. A total of 56 cities witnessed a decrease in resale home prices, up from 51 in the previous month, data from the NBS showed.