CHINA’S property sector may continue to decline, if not stagnate, next year. Despite an all-out campaign by financial regulators to rescue the sector, economists said a full recovery is still distant.

From land sales to financing, and from construction to interior decorations, property was China’s most important growth engine in the past two decades. It directly accounted for some 13 per cent of gross domestic product, or 30 per cent including related industries.

But the days of rapid, breakneck growth for the sector are over.