By Li Hongmei

China's average property prices in the country's 100 largest cities rose for 20 successive months at 0.63% in January from a month earlier and on a monthly basis gained 11.1% from a year earlier, climbing for 14 consecutive months, to 10,901 yuan (US$1,798) per square meter, but both growth rates shrank for the first time in nearly a year, according to statistics from the China Index Academy.

Ba Shusong, deputy director-general of the Financial Research Institute Development Research Center of the State Council, believes that current property prices in the mainland's first-tier cities are too high and the golden era for property is coming to an end.

The mainland's property prices have begun to show slower growth in January, compared with a month earlier, 62 major cities showing growth, 37 falling, with one unchanged, the academy said.

The academy's report said in January, the number of cities showing growth reduced by six compared with a month earlier, while the number of cities showing price declines increased by five.

Property prices of the 100 major cities in January rose 11.1% in January from a year earlier, with the growth rate shrinking 0.41 percentage points from a month earlier, the first instance of shrinking growth since January 2013, indicating that property prices might have peaked. The median property prices of the 100 major cities grew 0.47% from a month earlier to 7,192 yuan (US$1,186) per sq m.

Of the top 10 cities, property prices in nine cities showed smaller growth in January compared with December, while seven cities had growth of smaller than 1%, showing comparatively stable prices. Since the fourth quarter of 2013, several cities have adopted control and tightening policies on properties, trying to cool down booming property prices.

Approaching the Chinese New Year holiday, most property developers took a comparatively conservative line, thus leading to slower growth in January property prices,.

According to mainland media reports, Ba believes Beijing's relaxing control on foreign exchange will probably hit the mainland's property market, helping contain the property prices there. Compared with international cities like New York and London, the mainland's first-tier cities have seen their property prices remain too high, Ba said.

While demand for properties in the mainland's top-tier cities still exceeds the supply, the nation's third- and fourth-tier cities have seen oversupply in properties, thus resulting in a high vacancy rate, Ba said.