By Uma Shankari

MORE private home buyers are paying more than $1 million apiece for a property as prices climbed in the past year, a new report from DTZ shows.

The consultancy's Q2 2010 residential report also said that the share of transactions involving purchasers with HDB addresses has stabilised at around the 34-36 per cent mark in the last three quarters - despite the increase in prices - as these buyers are now supported by the rising HDB resale prices.

And among non-Singaporeans, buyers from mainland China are closing in on Indonesians as the second largest group of non-Singaporean purchasers.

Buyers from Malaysia still made up the largest group of foreign buyers in Q2.

DTZ's report is based on caveats lodged on private home transactions in the primary and secondary markets.

As of August 17, 9,437 caveats were available for analysis.

Buying sentiment cooled in May and June on the back of the European debt woes, local stock market jitters and an increased supply of land from the government land sales programme.

But despite this, the proportion of higher-priced homes that changed hands in the quarter continued to grow in Q2 2010.

The share of purchases for units that are at least $3 million edged higher to 10 per cent of all transactions recorded in the quarter, slightly higher than the 9 per cent in Q1 2010. Most of the transactions were in the prime districts of 9, 10 and 11.

More buyers also paid more than $1 million each for their new homes.