Based on Stamp Duty records, a total of 1,664 building units were sold and purchased in the first quarter of 2009, decreasing by 16.9 percent over the fourth quarter of last year, according to the figures released on Monday by the city's Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).

Given the stagnant property market of Macao in the first quarter of 2009, the total value of property transactions in the period dropped 20.5 percent quarter-to-quarter to just 2.13 billion patacas (270 million U.S. dollars), the DSEC said.

The majority of these transactions, the volume of which reached801 units, were residential units and the corresponding value amounted to 1.27 billion patacas (161 million dollars), decreasing by 37.7 percent and 41 percent respectively quarter-to-quarter, the DSEC figure showed.

In the first quarter of 2009, the average transaction price of Macao's residential units dropped by 5.3 percent quarter-to-quarter to 17,112 patacas (2,166 dollars) per square meter of usable area, the DSEC said.