In 2019, total real estate investments in China amounted to RMB 13.2194 trillion ($1.9 trillion), up 9.9 percent year on year, with this growth rate 0.3 percentage points lower compared to the January-November period of the same year, as announced by China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
Some lower growth of investments in property in the last months of the year reflected the overall economic slowdown. However, steel demand from the construction industry has not been hurt much. The main indicator influencing steel demand, the total area covered by new construction activity, increased by 8.5 percent in China in 2019, almost the same growth compared to the increase rate of 8.6 percent in the January-November period.
Nevertheless, in 2019, new commercial real estate sold in China covered a total area of 1715.58 million m2, down 0.1 percent on year-on-year basis, shifting from a 0.2 percent year-on-year rise for the first 11 months of the year.
Market participants and investors think that the real estate sector in China will perform better in 2020 than in 2019.