7th Annual Demographia International housing affordability survey: 2011

Ratings for metropolitan markets Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand United Kingdom, United States, China (Hong Kong) (Data for 3rd Quarter 2010)

• Joel Kotkin
• Demographia International

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04 February 2011Despite the bursting of the global housing bubble, the ratio of incomes to housing prices has shown a steady increase in many of the world's cities, particularly in in Australia as this report notes.

This international report rates housing affordability for metropolitan markets in Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand United Kingdom, United States, China (Hong Kong) and others.

In his introduction to the 7th edition, author Joel Kotkin cites markets such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York, adding that: perhaps most remarkable has been the shift in Australia, once the exemplar of modestly priced, high quality middle class housing, to now the most unaffordable housing market... He disputes "progressives" who wrongly claim that dense urbanism is the preference of the next generation... He says this promotes a form of neo-feudalism which reverses the great social achievement of dispersing property ownership.