I can name a number of USA cities that are experiencing housing shortages and rent/costs inflating far beyond where they would be if there wasn't a huge flight

I can name a number of USA cities that are experiencing housing shortages and rent/costs inflating far beyond where they would be if there wasn't a huge flight out of CA along with local political issues (NIMBYs, not allowing smaller vertical growth land lots). Austin, Seattle, Portland, Denver. All of these cities have been affected by this. My house value has gone up $40k in the last year. It's gone from sub 100s to a half a million over the last 5 years. This is far and away not only an SFBA regional issue. http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/2017/02/16/austins-housing-shortage-spreading-to-suburbs.html http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/2017/02/16/austins-ho... Our problem with Austin has always been the city council artificially limiting development. We didn't allow 10k sq foot lots until last year which means we're JUST now starting to build those 3-4 story townhouses near downtown. If you go to Dallas or Houston they are all over the place and little neighborhoods will feel vastly more populated than they do in Austin. The unfortunate part of this is that now younger people who could afford these townhouses are pushed into tiny studio apartments downtown or into houses 12-20 miles away from downtown. There was no in between if you didn't have millions to spend but wanted to live in/near downtown like there is in Houston/Dallas currently.