According to official data, the price of newly constructed houses in first-tier cities rose by 0.3 percent on average in February and the price of secondhand houses by 0.1 percent on average, which indicates that the realty market is in a stable condition. Thepaper.cn comments:

A comparison of data will help to understand the situation more clearly. The average price rise for newly constructed houses in first-tier cities was 0.1 percentage points lower than that of January, while that for secondhand houses remained the same.

The price of new houses in second-tier cities rose by 0.7 percentage points on average, the same rate as in the past three months.

This data breaks the rumor that realty prices have been rising abruptly in the first few months of this year. As early as February, some "analysts" were even predicting that the central authorities would loosen the regulations on the realty market.

However, this year's Government Work Report again stressed the role of the government in promoting the healthy development of the realty market. And on March 18, Vice-Premier Han Zheng again emphasized that the guiding philosophy must be that houses are for living in, not speculation.

All these moves and data show clearly that the government's control on realty market will not loosen, and market prices will not see any abrupt rise. Stable realty prices are important for the healthy development of the Chinese economy and the success of the country's economic transition.

More important, stable realty prices will curb investors from blindly investing in the virtual sector at a high leverage rate. That's important ballast for the Chinese economy.

There are always certain interest groups that hope realty prices will rise abruptly because they can profit from hyping the price of houses up. But their expectations are doomed to fail as long as the policies will remain in place to keep the real estate market stable.

People should not be taken in by rumors and should view the realty market rationally.