Property prices in China's 70 large and medium-sized cities rose 9.2 percent year-on-year in May, with the growth rate 0.9 percentage points lower than in April, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said on Friday.

In a statement published on its website, the NDRC said the prices of new residential properties rose 10.2 percent on a yearly basis in May, down 0.6 percentage points from April's growth rate.

The cities where property price growth exceeded 15 percent year-on-year last month included Urumqi, Haikou, Ningbo, Beijing and Hangzhou, which saw growth rates of 22.8 percent, 17.6 percent, 16.6 percent, 15.7 percent and 15.2 percent, respectively.

"The growth rate for Beijing is surprisingly high," said Carlby Xie, head of the research & consulting department of Colliers International Beijing branch, an international real estate service company.

"We expect the rental and sales price to see a mild increase in the third quarter rather than in the second quarter," Xie added.

However, for Qin Xiaomei, head of the research department of the commercial real estate services firm CB Richard Ellis's Beijing branch, the 15.7 percent increase was expected and even normal as Beijing's property price picked up in the second half of 2007.

"But we did notice an increasing number of property refunds and discounts in the market as more and more people take a wait-and-see attitude. However, the property price in key markets such as Beijing and Shanghai will maintain steady growth in the remaining months of this year, but in a much milder way."

Prices of pre-owned homes rose 8.8 percent year-on-year, 1.5 percentage points below the April growth rate. Non-residential property prices grew 6.5 percent, down 0.4 percentage points from April.

(China Daily June 14,2008)