The Illusion of Access: Is India’s Housing Market Rigged?

India’s housing market has been increasingly criticized as a rigged system where the dream of homeownership is systematically moved out of reach for the middle class, all while the government reforms like RERA, which stands for Real Estate Regulatory Authority, aimed to bring transparency, deep-seated structural issues continue to favor wealthy elites and large-scale developers over the average citizen which if you didnt knew constitute almost 80 percent of India.

A primary driver of this distortion is speculative land hoarding. A small number of influential families and developers control vast parcels of prime urban land, creating an artificial scarcity that inflates prices far beyond their intrinsic value. Furthermore, the persistent gap between official land circle rates and actual market prices fuels a shadow economy. Estimates suggest that a significant portion of high-value transactions still involves black money, which artificially pumps up valuations and forces honest taxpayers into a cycle of debt.

The "rigged" nature is further evidenced by the Price-to-Income ratio, where cities like Mumbai have a Price-to-Income ratio exceeding 11, nearly double the global affordability benchmark. When combined with restrictive Floor Space Index (FSI) laws that limit vertical growth, the result is a market designed for investors rather than end-users. Unless land markets are modernized and hoarding is penalized, India’s real estate sector will remain a playground for the affluent, leaving millions of families perpetually on the outside looking in.