BEIJING, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Average new home prices in China's 70 major cities rose 0.2 percent in January from a month earlier, slowing a touch from December, as government curbs continued to take the heat off the market, an official survey showed on Wednesday.
New home price growth has been slowing for four consecutive months since September, with only a 0.3 percent monthly increase in December.
Compared with a year ago, home prices still rose 12.2 percent, just off December's 12.4 percent gain, according to data issued by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
In China's biggest cities, Shenzhen, Shanghai and Beijing prices rose 18.2 percent, 23.8 percent and 24.7 percent, respectively, from a year earlier, but Shanghai and Shenzhen's monthly pace slowed as local governments' tightening measures knocked demand.
(Reporting by Beijing Monitoring Desk and Yawen Chen; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)