Consider this true story: Four friends used to travel to the outskirts of Beijing almost every weekend to enjoy the relaxing countryside, the fresh air and a barbecue meal on a quaint riverbank. That was their way of overcoming the stress of five days of tiring office work. But of late, one of the friends, Zhou Xin, has dropped out of the trips even though he seemed to enjoy them the most.

The reason: he has bought an apartment and has to save every farthing to pay the monthly installments for his housing loan.

It's not that Zhou does not earn enough. In fact, he earns 10,000 yuan ($1,633) a month, almost double the average salary of 5,223 yuan in Beijing. But then he has to shell out more than 2.5 million yuan for the 36-square-meter space in order to call it home.

Zhou is one of the millions of Chinese suffering the consequences of the high and still rising housing prices. From September 2012 to August 2013, the average real estate price in Beijing increased from 28,602 to 38,212 yuan per square meter. The situation has been the same in many other cities, and there is no sign of any change in the trend.

Some people argue that owning a house is not the be all and end all of life. But in China, like in most other countries, a house is a symbol of respectability and source of security. A 2010 US Department of Commerce report, "Middle class in America", listed homeownership as a prerequisite for a middle-class family. This is true in China as well, especially because tenants in the country lack legal protection and tradition demands that a wage-earner own a house. Little wonder, some economists say a person has to necessarily own a house to be part of the middle class in China.