The mainland needs to step up the implementation of cooling-down measures to cope with the overheating property market, an economist said yesterday.

It may take another four years for the market to cool down, CITIC Ka Wah Bank chief economist Liao Qun said.

Although the government has imposed austerity measures to curb the property market from overheating since 2004, Liao said, the property prices showed no signs of slowing down.

Last year, the high-end property prices recorded more than 10 percent increase in Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen. Liao attributed it to the technical and operational difficulties in the process of exercising the policies.

"For instance, in the aspect of restricting foreign investment on mainland property, the policy containing ambiguity, which allows Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan residents to buy certain type of houses," said Liao. "The inconsistency made the policy unable to implement effectively."

Regarding the levy of capital gain tax (CPT), Liao said the tax authorities failed to effectively calculate capital gain on a property transaction because of the absence of a property value system.

"Further, many vendors bypassed the CPT by choosing to pay the transaction tax, which is only as much as 1 to 2 percent of the transaction price," he said.

To cope with the situation, Liao expected the central government to strictly exercise existing measures in the coming four years.

"The government must ensure these measures take full effect," he said.

Liao also expected the government to introduce two more measures - real estate tax and the abolition of property pre-sales.

"They are unlikely to hit the market in the short term," he said.

Over the coming four years, Liao predicted the annual growth of Shanghai property prices could slow down to 3 percent. Big cities like Beijing and Shenzhen will also see the prices to grow by a single digit by then, he said.

"In the meantime, the growth in property investment is likely to slow to below 15 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) and the growth in property sales and price rise will respectively soften to 10 and 5 percent CAGR," he said.