More Chinese expect pick-up in home prices

BEIJING - More than a fifth of Chinese residents surveyed by the central bank expect home prices to rise in the third quarter of the year, the People's Bank of China said Tuesday.

The bank's survey indicated that 20.4 percent of 20,000 households in 50 cities expect the country's home prices to rise in the coming quarter, higher than the first quarter's 17.6 percent but lower than the 36.2 percent registered in the second quarter of 2011.

Some 15.7 percent of respondents said they have made home-purchasing plans for the next three months, 1.6 percentage points higher than in the first quarter.

Meanwhile, 68.5 percent of respondents said they believe housing prices are "unacceptably high", 0.8 percentage points higher than in the first quarter but lower than the 74.3 percent seen in the second quarter of 2011.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, 43 cities out of a statistical pool of 70 major cities saw month-on-month drops in new home prices in May, while six cities, up from three in April, saw slight increases of less than 0.2 percent in new home prices last month.