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Long-term increases in rental housing prices and utility costs combined with stagnant or falling incomes are creating escalating affordability pressures for U.S. renters. "Rental markets are now tightening, with vacancy rates falling and rents climbing," finds a new report by the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University

Data through March 2011, released today by Standard & Poor's for its S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices, the leading measure of U.S. home prices, show that the U.S. National Home Price Index declined by 4.2% in the first quarter of 2011, after having fallen 3.6% in the fourth quarter of 2010. The National Index hit a new recession low with the first quarter's data and posted an annual decline of 5.1% versus the first quarter of 2010. Nationally, home prices are back to their mid-2002 levels.

"The Joint Center publishes reports, Working Papers, conference proceedings, and Research Notes that make timely housing research available and accessible both within and outside the university."

This powerpoint presentation from Australia might be of interest