I live in the midwest (Wisconsin), the newer houses are from the 1950s and the older ones are from the 1900s. People prefer to live in specific villages or suburbs because of safety and community. The inner city is ridden with crime. These villages cannot expand as they were (in most cases) already developed in the 1950s. Here, multi-family houses don't sell well. Newer houses cost a lot more than older ones. To make matters worse, usually, families combine their income to buy a house but all of my friends and coworkers that are in their 30s are still single. Additionally, we have apartments here that cost more than single-family and they are usually advertised as "luxury apartments". To summarize,

- multi-family houses don't sell well

- no new housing development in years

- people are single and can't combine their income

- house prices have increased a lot more than people's income