With market conditions showing signs of recovery, a recently conducted study by research firm Crisil has painted a gloomy picture of housing segment, the worst hit sector due to global slowdown.

The firm said that home prices may further decline about 10 per cent in the second half of current financial year, primarily, due to oversupply of residential properties.

Faridabad in the NCR, Zirakpur and Derabassi in Mohali, High-Tech city Hyderabad and Rajiv Gandhi Salai in Chennai are among the areas that could see decline in property rates in coming months.

Global slowdown caused home prices to fall by 18 to 20 per cent in March 2009 in the midst of slowing economy and fears of job loss across the sector. However, customers are adopting wait and watch policy, hoping further improvement in the property rates.

Ravi Ramu, director, Puravankara Projects, a Bangalore-based developer, said, "We do not agree that prices will come down further. It becomes totally unviable to cut prices in the ongoing projects.''

A Unitech spokesperson also ruled out further fall in house prices saying that the people are giving good response to its recently launched projects. Meanwhile, Sudhir Nair, head of Crisil Research, said, "But prices will not increase the way they shot up in 2006 and 2007. Investors will not come back to the market unless they see prices going up in a sustained manner.''