In the third quarter of 2009, the average transaction price of Macao's residential units rose by 27. 6 percent quarter-to-quarter to 24,154 patacas (3,057 U.S. dollars) per square meter of usable area, according to the figures released on Tuesday by the city's Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).

A total of 5,345 building units were purchased and sold for a total amount of 8.98 billion patacas (1.14 billion U.S. dollars) in the third quarter of 2009, increasing substantially by 44 percent and 96.3 percent respectively from the second quarter, the DSEC figures indicated.

The majority, 3,681 units, of these transactions were residential units which amounted to 7.66 billion patacas (970 million dollars) in the period, soaring by 61.7 percent and 103.5 percent quarter-to-quarter respectively, according to the DSEC figures.

Among these residential units, 1,300 were sold for one million patacas (126,582 dollars) or less and 1,083 units for over one million patacas to two million patacas.

Aside from the residential units, the average transaction price of local office units also rose by 2.5 percent over the preceding quarter to 20,049 patacas (2,538 dollars) per square meter, while that of industrial units went down by 5.8 percent to 5,480 patacas (694 dollars) per square meter, the DSEC said.