China's overseas investment in the property sector stood at $6.6 billion in the first half of this year, accounting for almost one-third of the total money committed by Asian investors, the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) said on Saturday, citing data from commercial real estate services firm CB Richard Ellis (CBRE).
Data from CBRE showed that overseas property investment from Asia totaled $10 billion in the second quarter of 2015, up 8.9 percent from the first quarter.
In the first half, the U.S. received $6.1 billion worth of property investment from Asia, overtaking the UK ($4.4 billion) as the most popular target for Asian investors.
According to CBRE, China's investment in the US accounted for more than one-fifth of its total foreign investment, and most of the money went into hotels and centrally located office buildings, domestic news portal jiemian.com reported on Monday.
Among the target markets for foreign investment from Asian buyers, London was in the lead, the MOFCOM said.
About 85 percent of the investment capital in the UK went into London, which received $3.8 billion from Asian investors in the first half of 2015. New York ranked second, with $3.7 billion in investment, followed by Sydney with $2.2 billion, according to the MOFCOM.
Asian buyers' acquisitions of foreign hotels so far totals $5.8 billion, taking up one-third of the region's total foreign investment, the MOFCOM said.
Among the most prominent deals in the sector, insurer Anbang Insurance Group Co, based in the Chinese mainland, purchased the Waldorf Astoria New York hotel for $1.95 billion in February, which accounted for one-third of Asia's total overseas investment in hotels in the first half of 2015, jiemian.com reported Monday.
A survey on the Chinese rich conducted in July by China Confidential, a research entity under the Financial Times, revealed that 60 percent of the respondents planned to increase their holdings of overseas property in the next two years, news portal sina.com reported Tuesday.
