Large property developers to take bigger market share – and more of today’s China Real Estate Links | January 18, 2013

Here is a list of the day’s latest China real estate news collected from around the web:

• Large property developers to take bigger market share

  China’s real estate market will see further consolidation this year, with large-scale property developers taking more market share, real estate service provider World Union said in a report on Thursday.

  The top 20 property developers had a 20 percent market share in the first three quarters of last year, and the trend is set to continue in 2013, the report said.

• Sluggish Property Market in Third-tier Cities

  As major Chinese cities continue to record a rebound in home prices, smaller, third-tier cities are being hit hard by a sluggish market. All over the country, city planners and investors are suffering the consequences of overexpansion.

  In east China’s Changzhou City, a local apartment agent describes an ongoing building project on the main street.

• Property risk reigniting as China economy turns corner

  Business is booming in Beijing’s real estate offices — good news for property agents like Zhang Huanhuan, but a headache for China’s policymakers as worries resurface about the sustainability of investment in the sector.

  “We’ve got off to a flying start in 2013 — transactions are picking up, so are prices,” said Zhang, a saleswoman at an outlet of Maitian Real Estate Agency Co in the capital.

• China 4Q GDP Growth Seen Rebounding To 7.8%

  Economic growth in China, the world’s second-largest economy, may have quickened to 7.8 percent in the fourth quarter, snapping seven straight quarters of weaker expansion, but some analysts warn that the recovery is likely to be tepid and the modest rebound could peter out in mid-2013. “The figures that we saw for October and November were pretty strong, and the export figures for December were already quite strong too, compared with in the third quarter,” said Victoria Lai, China analyst at the Economist Intelligence Unit. “So I think that kind of underpins why we think the pickup will reach 7.8 percent in the fourth quarter.”

• China Foreign Direct Investment Falls for First Year Since 2009

  Foreign Direct Investment ( FDI ) into China in 2012 slipped 3.7 percent resulting from global weakness emanating from the eurozone. However, the $111.7 billion inflow of capital into China was only slightly lower than 2011’s record amount of $116 billion, despite a significant drop from the crisis-engulfed eurozone, who is normally a large investor of capital into China.

  In fact, the report actually had some positive signs for those concerned about the health of the economy as the government tries to engineer a transfer from an export-driven economic model to a domestic consumption model.

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