China’s Housing Market Is Still on Life Support

September and October are usually the peak season for China’s property sales. But things are looking different this year—and not in a good way. Until Beijing works up the gumption to intervene more decisively to restore confidence, the slow drift downward of the market—and the broader economy—seems likely to continue.

Chinese housing prices continued to fall last month. New-home prices declined 0.3% in August from the previous month, extending the slide to a whole year, official data released Friday showed. That brought the year-over-year drop to 2.1%. Smaller cities are faring particularly badly: Prices in third-tier cities fell 3.7% from a year earlier.