Shanghai's housing market warms up with ample supply

NEW home transaction exceeded the 100,000-square-meter threshold for the first time in seven weeks in Shanghai amid a rebound in supply, latest market data showed.

The area of new residential properties sold, excluding government-subsidized affordable housing, jumped 39 percent to about 116,000 square meters last week, Shanghai Centaline Property Consultants Co said in a report released today.

Outlying districts of Jiading and Qingpu maintained their leading positions amid rather ample supply compared to their more centrally-located counterparts. Some 25,000 square meter of new houses were sold in Jiading during the seven-day period through Sunday, a week-over-week rise of 8.7 percent. Qingpu, where seven-day sales totaled around 21,000 square meters, registered a surge of 40 percent, Centaline said.

The average cost of the new homes further advanced to 46,562 yuan (US$7,369) per square meter, which represented a moderate pace of 4.6 percent from the week earlier.

Middle-end products with a price of between 30,000 yuan per square meter and 50,000 yuan per square meter continued to dominate the local market with seven out of the 10 best-selling developments falling into that range, according to Centaline data.

Notably, a project in southern Minhang District costing 68,881 yuan per square meter became the most sought-after one after unloading 14,770 square meters, or 128 units, during the seven-day period. Two project in the top 10 list cost less than 30,000 yuan per square meter on average, one in Jiading and the other in Chongming.

On the supply side, about 126,000 square meters of new homes spanning four projects were released into the local market last week, compared with zero supply in the previous week.

"We expect the strength to extend amid continuously recovering sentiment among both home buyers and real estate developers," said Lu Wenxi, senior manager of research at Centaline.