CRI听力:China Home Prices Continue to Rise

Out of the 70 cities monitored, 63 have seen monthly home price increases in June, though it is down from 65 in May.

On a year-on-year basis, new home prices have risen last month in all the cities monitored except Wenzhou in Zhejiang.

Existing home prices are also increasing in value, with 55 cities reporting month-on-month price gains.

In the first-tier cities, home prices have all witnessed a sharp rise in both a monthly and yearly basis.

In Beijing, new home prices are an average of 1.7-percent higher than last month.

On an annualized basis, the cost of buying a home in Beijing is close to 17-percent higher than it was last year at this time.

Property prices here in China have been on the rise since the second half of last year when the new housing regulations were first brought in.

Runaway housing prices forced the government to bring in a number of measures to try to tighten up the market.

They include higher transaction taxes, restrictions on the purchases of multiple homes, and higher down payments.

Despite this, most industry observers say the moves have so far failed to stop the upsurge of property prices.

A number of real-estate experts say they believe the situation can't be turned around in the short term because of the supply-demand imbalance, particularly in big cities.

For CRI, I'm Su Yi.