Based on a review of the relevant literature, this paper uses data from 70 large and medium-sized cities to test whether the purchasing behaviours of Chinese urban residents are affected by air quality. Despite the indirectness of perceptions of air quality and the non-immediacy of the impact of air quality, buyers’ awareness of environmental factors plays an important role in their willingness to pay. This paper proposes that residents’ awareness strengthens the influence of air quality on commercial housing prices and conducts empirical tests to examine this proposition. To overcome the deviation caused by the heterogeneity of the samples, the paper also discusses whether the above relationship varies by region, development level and political level. The empirical results show that the average annual sales price of commercial housing decreases by 0.881 units for each unit of air pollution improvement. Comprehensive analysis finds that Chinese urban residents concern the air quality near commercial housing, but the degree of influence is weak. Residents’ level of awareness strengthens the influence of air quality on commercial housing prices, but the relationship varies by region, development level and political level.