Home prices in China will continue to fall, as new projects in particular face slowing demand, according to Shao Mingxiao, CEO of Longfor Group. He added that life is becoming tougher for builders after a slew of government measures in recent months to take the heat out of the market. “We see that the purchase cycle, from visiting a project to sealing the deal, has become longer as buyers are getting cold feet. Doing property business will be more difficult,” said Shao. “We will consider adjusting prices at some new projects. But we will not lower prices of those we’ve already started selling as it would cause damaging results.” China has seen angry protests erupt previously when developers have cut their prices at a project when sales are already under way.

In October, buyers who had paid full price for flats at two projects in Shanghai and Jiangxi reacted furiously when Country Garden Holdings, China’s largest developer by sales, slashed prices by up to 30%. Scores of people who had paid the original price gathered to protest, brandishing placards and chanting “return my hard-earned money!”. Although the bull run of Chinese property prices in the past two years is over, government intervention will ensure home prices slide without completely collapsing, said Shao. “The government will establish a long-term control system to keep the prices moving in a reasonable range, neither dipping too much nor hiking too much,” he said. The government’s most recent move came on July 31, when officials said the country would remain firm on “containing home price gains”, removing the word “excessive” from the phrase used in its previous policy stance.

Sales of new homes, measured by area, fell 1.3% in October from a year earlier, a bigger contraction than the 0.8% seen in September, based on data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The ailing market led to a U-turn in the strategy of many Chinese property developers, which had been rapidly expanding in response to the surging home prices over the past two years. Longfor’s contracted sales in October came to CNY15.04 billion, down 14% from CNY17.42 billion in September, which itself was flat compared to August, the South China Morning Post reports.