The housing shortage everywhere is created by the governments!
Rent control, zoning control and other regulations discourage private industry investments and encourage hoarding of unneeded real estate.
(We have this rent controlled appt, we really do not need it right now, but the rent is minimal and maybe, it the future, we might need it, but then we could not get it. So lets keep it, empty!)
So nobody or only the well connected, can do something, and they will make the rest to pay for it!
One of the biggest selling point of communism everywhere is rent control.
“The rent is too big, the landlords are getting rich on the backs of poor renters!”
And the effects of this policy is 100% predictable.
Huge housing shortages, people living in garages or subdivided apartments.
Yet on the flip side, there were always many empty apartments hoarded by the owners and lots of dilapidated, abandoned housing everywhere.