China's new home prices in June fell at the fastest clip in nine years while property sales and investment slumped, increasing pressure on policymakers for more stimulus to prop up the battered sector as it struggles to find a bottom.
New home prices slid 4.5 per cent from a year earlier, hitting the lowest since June 2015, deeper than a 3.9 per cent slide in May, according to Reuters calculations based on National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) data.
Prices were down 0.7 per cent month-on-month in June after a 0.7 per cent dip in May.
Since 2021, the property market's steep downturn has led to a series of developers defaulting, leaving numerous construction sites idle. This has eroded confidence in the sector, traditionally favoured by Chinese households as a safe haven for their savings.
The property sector which at its peak accounted for a quarter of GDP, remains a major drag on the USD 18 trillion economy.
Authorities have rolled out a flurry of support measures, including cutting home buying costs in major cities and allowing local governments to buy some unsold apartments and turn them into affordable housing.
"Recent supports are a step in the right direction but are still dwarfed by the scale of the problem. Real estate's tentacles run deep. When the sector hurts, pain is felt economy-wide," said Harry Murphy Cruise, economist at Moody's Analytics, in a research note.
Official data also showed China's economy grew 4.7 per cent in April-June, its slowest since the first quarter of 2023 and missing a 5.1 per cent analysts' forecast in a Reuters poll.
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