(Yicai Global) May 20 -- As China’s real estate market gradually recovers, investment has also begun to pick up this year, with more provinces shaking off yearly declines, according to the findings of a new report.

Investment in property development in 17 out of China’s 31 provinces had positive annual growth in the four months ended April, Shanghai E-House Real Estate Research Institute said in a regional market research report published today. Shandong, Jiangsu and Guangdong provinces are expected to see positive growth this month, it said.

Most of the top 10 provinces in terms of increased investment are in the west of the country, except for northeastern Jilin. The Tibet Autonomous Region was among the top 10, with a jump of almost 43 percent.

The uptick in investment in the western region is mainly down to the baseline being lower and a wider scope for urbanization than in the east, Yan Yuejin, research director at the Shanghai E-House, told Yicai Global.

Compared with the east, the western region was less affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, and labor was mainly local or from neighboring provinces, so the restart of production was quicker, which also led to the high growth rate of real estate investment, he added.

Only Tibet, Qinghai province and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region saw annual gains in commercial housing area sales from January to April. They are all in the western region with sparse populations and massive land areas, according to the institute’s data.

But Yicai Global has noted that real estate transactions in major business provinces, such as Jiangsu and Zhejiang in the east, have also been picking up. Though the sales area in the two provinces was still in annual decline in January to April, the retreat narrowed to 9.8 percent for Jiangsu and 10.8 percent for Zhejiang, a major rebound from the January to March period.

Recent property market deals in these provinces are generally good, and the yearly change in sold housing area is expected to soon change from negative to positive, making them leaders in the gradual recovery of the current property market, Yan said.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Peter Thomas