A woman walks in a community in Chaoyang district developed by Sino-Ocean Land. The group on Monday successfully bid for a piece of land, paying 4.08 billion yuan. It was among the highest in the city. [China Daily]

The land price record for residential housing in Beijing was broken twice on Monday.

After 64 bidding rounds, a plot of residential land in Daxing district in South Beijing was sold for 5.25 billion yuan (US$769 million), setting a new sales record for Beijing's housing market.

A real estate company, belonging to the Citic Group bought the 185,861 sq m plot of land for 17,000 yuan per sq m.

Earlier that day, a plot of residential land located at Dawangjingcun village in Chaoyang district was sold for 4.08 billion yuan to another real-estate developer, Sino-Ocean, according to information from the Beijing Land Coordination and Reserve Center.

The average price of land in the sale was 27,000 yuan per sq m, the highest in history.

Besides the land price record, the average property price in Beijing's real estate market continued to rise during the first two months of this year, attracting 20.49 billion yuan investment in total, a 71 percent increase compared with the same period last year.

According to statistics from the Beijing Municipal Statistics Bureau released on Monday, property prices rose 18.1 percent in February compared to January.

During the same period, Beijing started to build about 1.57 million sq m of new commercial buildings, 85 percent more than last year.

Within the Fourth Ring Road, the average house price reached 31,220 yuan per sq m, while outside the Sixth Ring Road the average price exceeded 10,000 yuan per sq m for the first time.

"The real estate market in Beijing will probably continue to roar in the Year of the Tiger, with house prices continuing to climb in a stable way," said Xuchao, director of the investment consultant department of Centaline Property in Beijing.

"House prices are a controversial and confusing issue in China. It even became a major topic during the past Two Sessions," said Xu.

"However, house prices in Beijing will not fall in the long term," said Xu. "The districts under development like Tongzhou, Daxing and Fangshan will see the main push in growth.

"The policy that allows foreigners who work in Beijing for one year to buy a house will bring even more investment money into the market," said Xu.

(China Daily March 16, 2010)