(Yicai) May 6 -- Despite many residents traveling over the May Day holiday, Shanghai's premium housing market remained vibrant, with newly launched luxury developments attracting prospective buyers.

Although the prices of the 1,000 newly marketed units had increased compared with previous batches, buyers were still willing to make purchases, Yicai learned during visits to several sales offices over the five-day break, which ended yesterday. In addition to luxury homes, relatively high-end properties priced around CNY10 million (USD1.4 million) were also in high demand.

“The number of visitors during the May Day holiday increased significantly compared to regular days,” said a sales person at a development in Shanghai’s Putuo district, where average unit prices range from CNY7 million to CNY10 million (USD970,000 to USD1.4 million). Due to the influx of viewers, staff had to guide two to three groups of clients through model homes at the same time.

Some projects sold out rapidly. For instance, more than 200 buyers registered to purchase all 120 units at a high-end development in Xuhui district within just five days. The total price per unit ranged from CNY41 million to CNY150 million (USD5.7 million to USD20.8 million).

Many new developments were released to the market ahead of the holiday, with a lot of them having already attracted strong buyer interest before launch, Lu Wenxi, a senior analyst at Shanghai Centaline Property Agency, told Yicai. Once made available, these properties notched up substantial contract numbers, Lu added.

A person involved in design work at a major state-owned developer in East China told Yicai that developing "good housing" has become the market trend. Developers are expected to put more emphasis on enhancing buyers’ living standards, raising the bar for innovation within their design and product teams, the person said.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Emmi Laine