Houston has the eighth-most affordable housing out of the Top 50 major metropolitan areas in the U.S. and is second in Texas behind San Antonio, according to a new study by Bizjournals.

Click the link above for videos from each of the speakers at from the "Land Use in Houston: Two Different Approaches" Forum we sponsored on February 26th at the George R. Brown Convention Center. We want to thank everyone who attended for making the event such a success.

An intriguing new analysis by a University of Washington economics professor argues that home prices have, perhaps inadvertently, been driven up $200,000 by good intentions.

Regarding Sunday's City and State cover article "Would more housing rules raise costs? / Some say Houston prices would jump; others say quality of life is bigger": A certain neighborhood wishes to limit the scale of a certain project.

Houston is the freest major city in America, with no zoning and only moderate government intrusions into how property owners use their land. This freedom has made Houston the most affordable major city in America, with housing costs that are less than half of most other major urban areas. This freedom has also created an innovative and growth-friendly environment that is creating tens of thousands of new jobs each year.

Houston remains a city of opportunity.

I say "remains," because other cities around the country have embraced land-use restrictions that have produced significant barriers to opportunity.

The ongoing housing downturn has served as a significant headwind for the U.S. economy, subtracting nearly a percentage point from the country’s gross domestic product growth in each of the past six quarters. However, this downturn has not been uniform across the country. Houston is an example of a metropolitan area that was seemingly immune to the trend until its housing market began slowing significantly in mid-2007.

Lan Nguyen had dreamed of owning a house since she immigrated to Southern California from Vietnam 11 years ago. But she and her husband could never scrounge up enough money for a down payment, spending most of their paychecks on rent for a cramped Garden Grove apartment.