Housing market shift not alarming, official says

The ministry in charge of housing policies is staying cool amid the sluggish property market, holding off from taking steps to energize the market.

"A shifting balance between demand and supply in real estate is a normal outcome of market regulation," Feng Jun, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development's chief economist, said at a news conference on Wednesday.

Feng continues to encourage provinces and cities to relax or tighten restrictions on housing as needed according to their supply and demand situations.

"The decline in some major indexes, such as the new construction areas and sales, comes largely from the large expansion in 2013," Feng said, adding that the drop will not be hugely significant.

Property prices are an important signal, but not the only goal in the governments' control of the real estate market, he said.

"We take efforts to guarantee real demand from people in need and to curb speculative investment," Feng said.

The average property price in 100 sampled cities fell by 0.32 percent month-on-month, the first such drop since June 2012. Besides, May was the fifth consecutive month that the rate of price growth slowed, according to the Beijing research institute China Index Academy Ltd.