There's a silver lining to those sky-high real estate prices in Beijing. It's apparently prompting more smart couples to wish for a baby girl instead of a boy.

In a one-child country that traditionally wants that one offspring to be male, another tradition is to buy that son an apartment when he gets ready to marry. There's no such pressure to do the same for daughters. That's why couples like the husband and wife owners of a software company in Beijing told Inter Press Service this month that they're hoping for a girl.

"It's too expensive to raise a boy, especially in big cities like Beijing and Shanghai. We have to buy him an apartment at least," the wife told the news agency. She said more of her friends are hoping for daughters, too, in the face of rising apartment prices.

The Financial Times of London is following the trend, too, and also reports this month that high real estate prices are driving the shift in attitudes. A Shanghai woman told the Financial Times she can't afford to buy a son an expensive apartment, much less pay for a son's wedding - another Chinese tradition. She wants a daughter, too.

In the US, by comparison, the parents of daughters have traditionally paid for all or most of the wedding. Buying a home for a son or a daughter is practically unheard of as a wedding present.

An offspring might one day inherit an old house from a grandparent, but the couple usually has bought their own home by then. By China's traditions, this makes a US citizen with a son more like the lucky parent of a daughter in China.

Back on the China front, the Shanghai woman also admitted to the Financial Times that another reason she wants a daughter is that she had been an unwanted daughter, ignored by a grandmother who'd rather she'd been born male.

If the increasing desire by couples for a daughter - for whatever reason - is a real trend, it's likely to be reflected in the upcoming results of a population count under way right now across China.

A Xinhua News Agency report earlier this year cited a slightly downward trend in the male-female birth gap in China.

According to the National Population and Family Planning Commission, the gap now stands at 119.45 boys born for every 100 girls. That's a 1.11-point dip, but still the first narrowing of the male-female birth ratio since 2006, Xinhua reported. In developed countries, the ratio is more like 100 boys born for every 107 girls.

In Beijing, with its big share of college-educated young parents, the gender gap already has narrowed to 104 men for every 100 women, China Daily reported this week, citing the Beijing Statistics Bureau. A new census count might show a continuing narrowing of the male-female birth ratio.

In modern cities like Beijing, that old saying about wanting a son to run a rural family farm doesn't make much sense, especially when females are scoring higher than males on tests that are supposed to lead to a better chance of success in big-city careers. Daughters are just as capable as sons to be successful, inherit family businesses and take care of aging parents, said the Beijing woman interviewed by Inter Press Service.

This is China's most educated generation, so any member of this college-educated generation can tell you that. Just ask them.

When it comes to taking care of parents when they grow old, why would parents in China think a son would take better care of them? Men on average today still are paid more than women in China. The same is true in the US and in many other countries. So, theoretically, men on average should have more financial resources to care for their aging parents than women.

But, realistically, what I see in neighborhoods in Beijing - just like back in the US - is a daughter playing the leading caretaker role when it comes to the physical work and time spent caring for elderly parents. Except that it's not always the elderly parents' daughter. Sometimes it's the daughter-in-law doing all that work.

So, moms and dads, is it really a son you want? Or, if you aren't lucky enough to have a daughter, is it the future daughter-in-law that you really want?