(Yicai) Feb. 19 -- China’s eight-day lunar new year holiday failed to lift home sales much, with only some real estate projects in a few tourist spots and cities whose townsfolk work elsewhere seeing an increase in demand, industry insiders told Yicai.

Sales of new homes in 25 representative Chinese cities fell 27 percent over the holiday that ended on Feb. 17 compared with the year-earlier period, according to the latest data from the China Index Academy.

A property developer in East China recorded a modest increase in transactions in third and fourth-tier cities, but much lower sales in first and second-tier cities over the Chinese New Year break, a source at the company said. Overall sales equaled about 60 percent of the figure a year earlier, the person noted.

Traveling was popular among Chinese people over holiday, but they showed little willingness to buy property, according to the manager of a residential project. 

A source at one of China’s top 10 builder’s said the firm sold CNY2.2 billion (USD305.8 million) of property over the holiday, or around CNY275 million (USD38.2 million) a day, versus a daily CNY400 million during last year's break.

A central state-owned developer had lower turnover in Nanjing compared with a year earlier because the city had a large stock of pre-owned homes, with their prices much lower than that of newly built property, according to its manager in the city. Many projects in Fuzhou sold only three apartments or fewer during the holiday, the marketing manager of a local builder added.

Still, some projects in tourist destinations and third-tier cities with large populations that work away in first-tier and second-tier cities saw more robust demand.

House prices in Linyi have sunk about 30 percent over the past two years, attracting many buyers back from their places of work during holidays, a local sales agent told Yicai, noting that during just one day over the Chinese New Year he showed seven or eight clients around properties and had no time to eat.

A source at a developer in East China said sales rose over the holiday at projects in central parts of cities in Henan, Jiangxi, and Yunnan provinces with large numbers of returning migrant workers. But the company's national performance did not improve much, and sales jumped only slightly from a month earlier, the person added.

Many potential home buyers still adhered to a wait-and-see approach over the holiday, said Chen Wenjing, market research director at the China Index Academy. But the real estate market is expected to gradually stabilize as previous policy easing takes effect, Chen noted.

Editor: Tang Shihua, Martin Kadiev