Hong Kong's housing market is recovering in December from the November gloom but was still far behind the boom in 2007, revealed the Land Registry's latest statistics Monday.

The Land Registry recorded 5,437 registration of flat sale and purchase agreements in December, up 43.6 percent from November but still down 65.1 percent from the same period in 2007.

Using a 12-month moving average, the figure for December, however, represented an 8.2 percent drop on November and a 22.2 percent dip on December 2007.

Total consideration was 20.5 billion HK dollars (2.64 billion U. S. dollars), up 92.7 percent on November but down 68.2 percent on a year earlier, according to the Land Registry.

Of the sale and purchase pacts, 4,706 were for residential units, up 44.2 percent on November but down 65.1 percent on December 2007. The total consideration was 17.7 billion HK dollars (2.28 billion U.S. dollars), up 96.1 percent on November but down 66.4 percent on a year earlier.

(Xinhua News Agency January 5, 2009)