Some housing facts

 From In These Times

• 24.7%: U.S. renters who spend more than half their income on rent.
• 49.5%: Those who spend more than the federal threshold of “affordable” (30% of income).
• 7,000,000: Nationwide shortage of affordable homes for low-income renters. 
• 552,830: People experiencing homelessness on a single night in 2018.
• 7,400,000: Americans forced to move in with friends or family.
• 32%: Increase in median rent from 2001 to 2015.
• 97%: Increase in the number of homes renting for $2,000 or more between 2005 and 2015.
• 80%: U.S. markets where home prices are growing faster than wages.
• 1%: U.S. counties where a fair-market one-bedroom rental home is affordable for a full-time minimum-wage worker.
• 103: Weekly hours worked at minimum wage needed to afford a one-bedroom home at national average fair-market rent.

There are at least 10 million unoccupied homes in the US. Houses are built for profit not need. Thus, particularly during a slump, brick mountains, empty houses, mothballed developments, and unemployed builders exist alongside the homeless and those living in sub-standard accommodation.