China to launch nationwide inspection on commercial housing sales

Photo taken on Sept 26, 2014 shows a real estate under construction in Yiwu, East China's Zhejiang province. The sales of commercial housing in Zhejiang province have slumped by 19.5 percent in the first three quarters of 2014, according to the data issued by the provincial statistics authority. [Photo/Xinhua]

BEIJING - China will launch a nationwide inspection on sale prices of commercial property in its latest effort to standardize the country's property market.

From Oct 30 to Nov 30, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development and the National Development and Reform Commission will jointly inspect irregularities of real estate developers and agents on commercial property sales.

Irregularities include fabricating information on housing sales, publishing fake advertisements and artificially inflating housing prices, market manipulation and hoarding unsold homes, according to a notice released by the two departments.

Irregularities will be punished severely and typical cases will be exposed publicly to ensure effectiveness of the inspection, according to the notice.

China's property market continued to cool as home prices faltered or posted slower growth in major cities amid tough policies to curb speculation.

Of 70 cities surveyed, home prices in 44 cities rose month on month in September, compared with 46 in August, the National Bureau of Statistics said.

The Chinese authorities have constantly reiterated that "houses are built for living in, not speculation," and analysts expect housing controls to last for the rest of the year at least.

Authorities are studying a "long-term mechanism" for real estate regulation and advancing legislative work on the development of the home rental market.