| Housing prices surge 7.1 percent in 70 cities |
SHANGHAI, July 23 -- HOUSING prices in 70 major cities in China surged an average of 7.1 percent last month from a year earlier led by strong growth in Beijing and Shenzhen, the National Development and Reform Commission said on its Website today.
Shanghai reported a mild year-on-year growth of 1.2 percent in June, and second-hand apartments in the city were priced 1.5 percent higher from a year earlier, the commission said.
Shenzhen's housing price boomed 15.9 percent in June, with new apartments jumping 13.9 percent and second-hand homes up 16.1 percent, the report said.
Shanghai Securities News said earlier that Shenzhen's average price for new properties rocketed 40 percent in the first half and the average price in June was 14,500 yuan (US$1,918) per square meter.
Property prices in Beijing rose 9.5 percent in the month from a year earlier. New property prices surged 10 percent and second-hand homes were up 9.4 percent, the report said.
Strong real estate growth was also reported in Beihai City (15.5 percent) of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Nanjing (11.3 percent), Jiangsu Province, and Shijiazhuang (9.4 percent), Hebei Province.
China last Friday announced it raised the one-year benchmark lending rates by 0.27 percentage points to 6.84 percent from Saturday and raised deposit rates from 3.06 percent to 3.33 percent.
The moves were made to cool off the country's sizzling economy, including excessive spending on factories and real estate.
Investments in real estate development rose 6.2 percent to 61.96 billion yuan in the first six months, a fall from 19.8 percent in the first quarter.
China last year tightened credit to developers, boosted supervision over land use and improved the enforcement of tax policies to cool down a real estate boom.
However, the moves seemed ineffective as major cities all reported rapid growth this year.
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