BEIJING, April 17 (Xinhua) -- The average prices of new homes in 70 Chinese cities rose six percent in the first three months over the same period last year.

    A survey of large and medium-sized cities by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the National Bureau of Statistics showed the prices of new commercial residential homes in Beijing were up 9.9 percent last month over March last year, ranking third after Shenzhen's 10.7 percent rise and Changsha's 10.1 percent.

    The price hike follows a series of government measures to cool the country's overheating real estate market.

    Other cities that reported high growth in new house prices included Guangzhou, where prices rose by 8.6 percent, Chengdu, at 8.4 percent, Fuzhou at eight percent and Xiamen, 8.4 percent.

    Shanghai's new house prices continued the slight rise in February, up 0.2 percent from the same month last year.

    Investment in the real estate sector rose by 26.9 percent to 354.4 billion yuan (46 billion US dollars). The growth is 6.7 percentage points higher than that of the same quarter of last year and 1.6 percentage points higher than the growth of urban fixed assets investment in the same period.

    Investment in residential housing rose by 30.4 percent with that in affordable housing for middle and low income families up 41.6 percent, 39 percentage points higher than a year ago.

    It showed the structure of China's real estate development the decline in investment in affordable residential housing had turned, said the NDRC report released on Tuesday. "The real estate market is developing to the anticipated goal."

    The NDRC report said investment in commercial residential homes smaller than 90 square meters accounted for only 16.1 percent of the total investment in the first three months.

    Large homes over 120 square meters were still the biggest sellers in the market and the task improvements were still required in the residential housing structure, said the report.