SINGAPORE, Oct. 30 (Xinhua) -- There appear to be as many new home sales this year in Singapore as in the record year of 2007, according to local newspaper Straits Times on Friday.

    However, the total value of these private homes is only about half of that two years ago, which can be attributed partly to a rise in sales of smaller, mass market units.

    The running total for units sold in the first three quarters of this year is 12,828 compared to the boom year of 2007's 14,811. The total value of new home sales, from January this year to the first week of October, however, was 1 billion Singapore dollars (0.7 billion U.S. dollars), which was just 48.6 percent of 2007's record.

    The report said that this is because back in 2007, the luxury end of the residential market achieved top-line record prices with units that were usually large in size.

    This year, mass market homes positioned to attract public housing upgraders accounted for most of the demand and developers were keen to ensure affordability this year as they scrambled to reconfigure their unit sizes to allow for smaller apartments.

    Another key difference was the number of foreigners buying into Singapore's private housing market. In 2007, 1,736 foreigners bought new homes, while so far this year, only 651 foreigners have bought new homes here.

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