Do Indian Newspapers Report False Real Estate Prices??

Almost all the Indian newspapers that I read on a daily basis have started an exclusive section called 'Real Estate'. This particluar section is a major revenue generator for them because I see a lots of advertisement on the pages.

On the right hand side of the main page there was a column that talked about the rates that are 'prevalent' in the Delhi/NCR region. I was absolutely shocked to read the prices, they were higher than what even the brokers were quoting. The Source of the property rates in various locations of Delhi/NCR was a property website.

So I picked that newspaper and website and started some analysis. (I will not take newspaper or names of the property website for obvious reasons.)

The 'prevelant price of any product be it cement, steel , stocks, food, property is determined by the 'Transaction' price. For the benefit of the starters when a trade happens it has two prices. One is the 'Seller' Price , which is the price at which seller quotes a product. Other is the 'Bid' Price, which is the price which buyer is willing to pay for the product. And when the seller and buyer price matches the product is sold at a price which is called 'transaction' price. The same principle applies across all markets and stock exchanges of the world.

So if a seller wants to sell a house at $200,000 but the buyer is willing to pay only $150,000 the transaction does not happen. Now if somebody asks what is the 'Prevalent' rate of the house. What do you say? Do you quote Seller's price $200,000 or the $150,000 which buyer is willing to pay. We know that no transaction happened. Here the newspapers fool peole by doing a small fraud.

I logged in to the property website whose source the newspaper had quoted and started looking for rates in Delhi/NCR region. I noticed that the 'prevalent' property prices quoted were the "Seller' Price. It was not the price at which the 'transactions' were happening. The property websites in UK always report the 'Transaction' price in an area. It doesn't matter what stupid price the 'Seller' wanted to sell his house for.

If some persons log into a website and wants to sell 1 BHK for 1 million dollars, does it become the so called 'prevalent' prices in that area. who is validating it? No one. And all these newspapers report these ambiguous rates.

Interestingly on the same property website there was Find buyer section where I tried to find what is the price a buyer is willing to pay for the 'property' in Delhi/NCR area. There were more than 45K buyer's and they also had mentioned the price they were willing to pay for the house.
Below is the chart. You can see the number of buyers who have the budget between a price range.

(Click on image to enlarge)

So you have seen that these are the kind of prices a buyer is willing to pay for the house. This is the 'prevalent' rates of property. This is the price at which the supply should come in.
You can see that hardly there is any demand for houses priced at above 60 lakhs INR. But 90% of the prices are above 60 lacs. Even after my IIT degree I am not able to undertand the maths of the property websites, newspapers and the builders. Clearly some nexus exists between them.

Let us create the awareness movement and let us tell to everyone so that these guys are not able to fool us.