(Yicai Global) Jan. 9 -- Vanke Co., China's second-largest property developer, is cautious about the outlook for the country's real estate market this year as buyers take a wait-and-see attitude against a backdrop of the most stringent regulatory policies in Chinese history.

"This year may not be as good as last year," said Zhu Xu, secretary to the Shenzhen-based company's board. 2018 "is likely to have low growth."

Sales will be more difficult to eek out after the commercial housing sector reached a new peak in 2017 and as government intervention to cool the market bites hard. Soaring prices in 2015 and 2016 triggered a nationwide market regulation campaign last September. Buyers are now being careful, with only cost-effective developments attracting substantial interest.

"The company hasn't started any new projects yet," Zhu said at a news conference yesterday.

A number of developers had good sales last year thanks to their performance in third- and fourth-tier cities. "It's difficult to judge whether third- and- fourth-tier cities this year will repeat their showing of 2017," Zhu said. "It's also hard to see whether sales growth in 14 typical cities in 2018 will be positive or negative," he added, referring to destocking in third- and- fourth-tier cities this year.

Vanke's sales hit CNY530 billion (USD82 billion) last year, ranking the company second in the sector for two straight years, Zhu said. Contracted sales almost tripled to CNY62.23 billion in December from a year earlier. It kicked off the most projects in 2017 during last month, with the second-highest subscription rate for the year, second only to March's 400,000 square meters worth CNY64 billion.

December price cuts brought significant results, Zhu said. The new project subscription rate topped 60 percent last month, boosting sales. Nanjing, Ningbo, Changchun, Shenyang and other cities marked up good gains compared with November. Most are second- and third-tier cities.