One third of real estate developers suffered a loss in 2015

A property construction site in Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu province. [Photo/China Daily]

Among 50 mainland-listed property developers, 23 reported profit decline in 2015, said Beijing Times on Tuesday.

Fifteen Chinese real estate companies projected a loss, accounting for nearly 30 percent of the developers that have released their preliminary earnings report.

Among them, 13 property firms reported annual loss for the first time, said the newspaper citing data from RoyalFlush Information. Shanghai-based developer China Enterprise Co said it expects a loss of as much as 2.5 billion yuan ($380 million) in 2015.

Such growth headwind has been shared by some bigger players, as Poly Real Estate Group, the country's second-largest property developer by market value, on Friday reported its lowest profit increase in 10 years.

The company's preliminary net profit amounted to 12.3 billion yuan last year, up by only 1.18 percent year-on-year, it said in a filing to the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

China's real estate market took a downturn in 2014 after years of investment chasing. Growth of property investment slowed to one percent in 2015, a sharp decrease from the 10.5-percent growth in 2014.

Analysts expected a modest pickup in property sales in 2015, in part helped by interest rate cuts and the lifting of home purchase restriction.