China property price rally likely to stall in 2018: poll

Beijing

CHINA'S home price growth is likely to stall in 2018 as a surprise boom in smaller cities is expected to lose steam while measures to tighten credit and other property curbs continue to constrain the market, a Reuters poll showed on Wednesday.

China has imposed an array of measures to crack down on property speculation since early 2016, but prices in October still crept up 5.4 per cent from a year earlier, largely driven by a buying frenzy that has spread from the big metropolises to the country's less-regulated smaller centres.

A softening but still resilient property market in the year ahead, underpinned by steady prices, would be welcome news for China's policyma…