Hong Kong’s dizzying property prices may finally be falling but they are still notching up records, with a survey released yesterday showing the Chinese territory has consolidated its status as the world’s least affordable housing market.

Median prices in the third quarter of last year were 19 times the median annual pre-tax household income — the highest in the 12 years of Demographia’s International Housing Affordability Study. That compares with second-ranking Sydney, with a median multiple of 12.2, seventh-placed San Francisco on 9.4 and London, eighth, at 8.5.

Between 2003 and their September 2015 peak, property prices in the city soared 370 per cent, fuelled by record-low interest rates, a buoyant economy and interest from mainland Chinese buyers. The cost and availability of housing in Hong Kong is a sore point for citizens, many of whom live in cramped, overcrowded conditions.