China Vanke Co Ltd, the country's largest real estate developer by sales, posted a 18 percent rise in third-quarter profit as its strategy to build mid-tier apartments helped cushion the impact of government property curbs.

For the July-September period, Vanke's net profit rose to 1.6 billion yuan ($262.92 million) from 1.35 billion yuan a year earlier, the company said in a filing on the Shenzhen stock exchange on Tuesday.

During the quarter, China Vanke posted revenue of 20.7 billion yuan, up 44.8 percent from a year ago.

Many analysts contacted by Reuters said they did not have estimates for third quarter or nine-month results for China Vanke.

Despite China's property-cooling measures, home prices rose at their fastest pace in three years in September, fuelling concerns that a housing bubble could threaten the health of the world's second-largest economy and worries that authorities may unveil more tightening policies.

China Vanke said earlier this month its nine-month sales hit 128.5 billion yuan, up 33 percent from 96.3 billion yuan a year ago.

Other rivals, such as China Overseas Land & Investment Ltd and Guangzhou R&F Properties Co Ltd, earlier this month also posted strong nine-month contract sales, which are an indication of developers' future revenues.

Vanke's Shenzhen shares closed up 1.4 percent on Tuesday before the results were announced, compared with a 0.3 percent rise on the CSI300 index, which groups the country's biggest listed firms in Shanghai and Shenzhen. They have fallen 12.5 percent so far this year.