Detroit ranks no. 15 on national list of apartment boom towns

If you're looking to rent or build a rental property in Detroit, the gold rush is on.  Excerpt: "The conditions are right for rental housing in general and apartments in particular to remain popular for a while, said housing expert John McIlwain, senior resident fellow at the  Urban Land Institute, a nonprofit land-use research and education group. “Housing prices are going to go up, and credit remains tight,” he said. At the same time, unemployment remains relatively high for people in their 20s and 30s, and many of them are burdened with student debt, McIlwain added. So, many people are delaying buying homes. Meanwhile, construction costs are rising. “The big challenge to industry is to provide rental housing at prices that middle-income people can afford,” he said. That’s why, when we wanted to determine America’s Top 15 Apartment Boom Towns, we included a measure of affordability. We also looked at indicators of apartment availability, economic growth and population growth for the 100 most populated metro areas in the U.S.; the data covered 2009 to 2013, depending on the category." More here.