In a move to curb soaring real estate prices, the Central Bank has teamed up with two major financial supervisory agencies to establish a new platform for monitoring housing loans, trying to thwart speculators through enhanced transparency in property prices.

It is impossible for most people earning average salaries to purchase a place in Taipei city.

In order to prevent investors from jacking up real esate prices, The Central Bank, Financial Supervisory committee, and the Joint Credit Information Center has teamed up to setup a monitoring system of housing loans, which started on the 20th.

Member banks can now check on investors to find out who have simultaniously applied for loans at various banks before they make decisions on loan approval.

In addition, the system would report the average trade prices of all districts for the Construction and Planning Agency in the hope of making real esate transactions more transparent. After the Central Bank's second selective credit control, the society paid more attention on bank loan approval rate, and some banks believe the system can improve real esate pricing mechanism.

While the new system is accessible to member banks exclusively, and only average stats are available, banks can still use the data to make wiser choices in granting loans and help to prevent further hikes in housing prices.