HONG KONG - Hong Kong on Thursday sold three residential sites for HK$5.73 billion ($737 million), at the top end of estimates despite efforts to cool the overheated property market.

Hong Kong has imposed new taxes and staged a series of land auctions in the past year-and-a-half to boost land supply amid warnings of a looming real estate bubble.

here were however no immediate signs of a slow-down, with the three sites sold at the top end of market expectations.

One of the sites, located on Stubbs Road in the city's Mid Levels area, was expected to fetch HK$3.5 billion to HK$4.52 billion in a poll of six analysts by Dow Jones Newswires, and sold for HK$4.49 billion.

The other two sites, one in Kowloon and another in the New Territories, were also sold at the top end of market expectations, fetching HK$579 million and HK$662 million respectively.

Thursday's land auction was the second held by the government this year, after a residential plot in Kowloon put up for auction two weeks ago beat pre-sale estimates and went for HK$1.52 billion.

The plot had been expected to sell for about HK$1.28 billion by analysts.

The bid to sell off more land in the city of seven million, famous for its sky-high residential rents, came after a study by US consultancy Demographia in January found Hong Kong's home prices were the least affordable in the world.

Ballooning prices have sparked public anger in a territory traditionally associated with laissez-faire economic policies, and a warning from the International Monetary Fund of a potential asset bubble. Hong Kong's average home prices soared about 24 percent last year, with some lawmakers calling for the resumption of a subsidised housing scheme because of concerns about the city's growing income gap.

Source: AFP