Second-hand home transaction volume is catching up with the previous bull market, as Shanghai's real estate market pushes toward the "30,000-unit milestone"

Since March, the Shanghai second-hand housing market has continued to heat up, with transaction volumes approaching a critical threshold.

According to data from “Online Real Estate,” as of March 22, the total number of second-hand housing transactions in the city has reached 21,443 units, with an average daily transaction volume nearing 1,000 units. Under the combined effects of policy easing and the traditional “Golden March and Silver April,” weekly transactions have reached a new high since 2021, with single-day online signings on weekends repeatedly exceeding 1,400 units, significantly enhancing market activity.

The industry generally considers a monthly transaction volume of 20,000 units as the “line of prosperity and decline,” while 30,000 units indicates an entry into a clearly active range. Given the current transaction pace, the Shanghai second-hand housing market is once again challenging the “30,000 unit barrier” after several years, becoming not only the core suspense of market attention but also an important barometer of whether confidence in the property market can truly be restored.

Behind the surge in transactions, prices have not yet shown a synchronized increase, but the space for negotiation has noticeably narrowed, with some landlords raising their expectations, and the phenomenon of “jump pricing” has begun to appear sporadically.

Shanghai’s real estate market enters a critical period of a “week-long sprint.”

Whether the monthly transaction volume can surpass the “30,000 unit barrier” has become the biggest suspense in the current Shanghai second-hand housing market.

According to data from “Online Real Estate,” as of March 22, the transaction volume of second-hand housing this month has already reached 21,443 units, with an average daily transaction volume of 975 units. If this average daily volume can be maintained, it is highly likely that the total transaction volume in March will exceed 30,000 units.

The Shanghai real estate market has not experienced such heat in a long time. From March 9 to March 15, the transaction volume of second-hand housing reached 7,233 units, setting a weekly transaction record since 2021; the single-day online signing volume on March weekends frequently broke 1,400 units, and although March 20 was a weekday, the daily transaction volume also exceeded 1,000 units, a situation that has been very rare in the past five years.

Although March is traditionally the peak season for real estate sales, this year’s performance clearly exceeds the previous two years.

In contrast, the average daily transaction volume in March 2024 was only around 500 units; while March 2025 saw a small peak in transactions, with a total of 29,300 second-hand housing online signings for the month, according to data from the Shanghai Lianjia Research Institute, the transaction volume of second-hand housing in Shanghai this year still shows a 15% increase compared to the same period last year.

“There is a good chance that the second-hand housing transaction volume in March this year will exceed 30,000 units, but we need to see the data for the following week, especially this weekend. If the daily transaction volume can maintain 1,400 units on Saturday and Sunday, then it will really exceed 30,000 units, which will indicate a significant reversal in market sentiment,” said Lu Wenxi, a senior analyst at Shanghai Zhongyuan Real Estate, to Yicai.

Within the real estate industry, a monthly transaction volume of 20,000 units in Shanghai’s second-hand housing market is considered the “line of prosperity and decline.” A monthly transaction volume of 20,000 units indicates that the second-hand housing market is in a stable state, while surpassing 30,000 units usually means the market has entered a hotter range.

The last time the transaction volume of Shanghai’s second-hand housing market exceeded 30,000 units in a single month dates back to early 2021, when the market was at the tail end of the previous bull market. In order to curb the overheating second-hand housing market, Shanghai at that time implemented measures such as “price verification” and “three prices at the lowest.” Since the end of 2022, the Shanghai second-hand housing market has entered a lengthy adjustment period lasting several years.

“Currently, transaction volumes are indeed substantial. Besides the traditional peak sales season, there is also the driving effect of the ‘Shanghai Seven Measures’. Market sentiment is indeed quite strong. The key is whether we can surpass last year’s transaction data; if so, confidence in the property market will be rebuilt, which is very important,” Lu Wenxi stated.

The phenomenon of landlords raising prices appears sporadically.

As the sentiment in Shanghai’s second-hand housing market continues to rise, many netizens have recently posted on social media, claiming they encountered landlords “jump pricing” during their house-hunting process.

“The agents seem to be very busy, landlords are raising prices at any moment. Is it real or just a show for me?” one netizen asked.

Another citizen who is currently selling their house recently told reporters, “I started listing my property at the end of last year. At that time, I referenced the listing prices of other similar units in the community and set a relatively high price. But recently, after doing some research, I found that my asking price has become one of the lowest in the community.”

In the current market conditions, are many landlords really raising prices? To find out, reporters interviewed several frontline market players.

A manager at a M8-level Lianjia store told reporters, “Recently, I haven’t encountered any situations of landlords jumping prices, but many sellers’ mindsets have indeed changed, and negotiating the price of houses is not as easy as before.”

A real estate agent deeply involved in the Yangjing area of Pudong stated, “Recently, both my viewing volume and transaction volume have indeed increased, and I’ve been quite busy. I’ve noticed that many clients who were originally hesitant have now made purchases, but house prices have not shown any significant increase compared to before, nor have I seen any temporary price jumps from owners.”

“Actually, there haven’t been any obvious changes in house prices; it’s just that negotiating has become more difficult. Many people feel that the prices of listings have gone up, a significant factor being that in recent months, the market has consumed a large number of low-priced quality listings, leaving the remaining listings appearing more expensive,” said an agent located in the Gucun area of Baoshan.

Lu Wenxi believes that “landlord price jumps” should only be the behavior of a small portion of landlords; however, coincidentally, he himself recently encountered a landlord raising prices during his house-hunting process.

“I visited a property priced over 10 million, and the landlord said he wanted to raise the price by 500,000 because there have been too many people viewing it recently. The landlord’s mindset has improved, and he started to squeeze the psychological space of buyers,” Lu Wenxi said.

Notably, according to the latest publicly released data from the National Bureau of Statistics, Shanghai’s housing prices have shown clear signs of stopping the decline and rising.

On March 16, 2026, the National Bureau of Statistics released data indicating that in February 2026, Shanghai’s new housing prices rose by 0.2% month-on-month, making it one of the only two cities among first-tier cities to see an increase (the other being Beijing); second-hand housing prices also rose by 0.2% month-on-month, making it one of the only two cities among 70 large and medium-sized cities to see an increase (the other city also being Beijing), ending a continuous decline for nine months since May 2025.

Zhang Bo, director of the 58 Anjuke Research Institute, stated that this housing price data has conveyed a clear positive signal, indicating that the market has shown signs of structural recovery, with improved products in core first and second-tier cities becoming the mainline of recovery.

Lu Wenxi believes that Shanghai’s “Golden March and Silver April” small spring will be realized, expecting that the total transaction volume of second-hand housing in April this year will still be able to maintain an active range, while whether housing prices can remain stable and whether transaction volumes can hold up in May and June will become important observation dimensions in the future.

(This article is from Yicai)