7/85Amount spent for federal housing programs in 1984: $11,300,000,000
1/86Percentage of Jeeps sold in 1984 that were bought by people living in urban or suburban areas: 59
Percentage spent today: 24
8/87Number of Palestinian homes in the West Bank that have been demolished or sealed by Israel since 1967: 1,500
4/88Estimated waiting time for a vacancy in a New York City public-housing project (in years): 18
4/88Percentage change, since 1981, in federal funds budgeted for subsidized housing: -81
4/88Number of garages in Los Angeles that are used as homes: 42,300
5/88Average number of homeless people in New York City shelters and welfare hotels each day in 1987: 28,000
Estimated number of vacant New York City apartments that landlords kept off the market during 1987: 45,000
2/89Portion of all single-family homes sold in the United States each year that are mobile homes: 1/4
6/89Estimated number of New York City residents temporarily living with others because they have no apartment: 360,000
8/90Number of families who have applied to purchase homes at Love Canal this year: 225
9/90Federal housing funds spent by New Jersey’s Passaic Housing Authority in 1988 and 1989 to feed stray cats: $14,865
8/91Average number of Israeli apartments damaged in each Scud attack before Patriot missiles were deployed: 219
10/92Portion of all homeowner tax-deduction benefits that went to households earning more than $75,000 last year: 1/2
Portion that went to households earning less than $40,000: 1/10
11/92Ratio of the number of West Bank housing units whose construction was suspended in July to those still being built: 2:3
11/92Percentage change in housing prices near Washington’s Hanford Nuclear Reactor since its cleanup began in 1989: +50
4/92Ratio of federal spending on prison construction to federal spending on public-housing construction since 1990: 4:3
4/92Amount President Bush proposes to spend on construction of new public housing in 1993: 0
Percentage of all spending the President proposes for the next five years that will come from Pentagon budget cuts: 0.6
5/92Chances that a white American earning less than $28,000 per year will be denied a mortgage: 1 in 4.3
Chances that a black American earning more than $42,000 per year will be denied a mortgage: 1 in 4.7
3/93Percentage change, since 1970, in the number of mobile homes in the United States: +230
5/93Number of portraits of Zsa Zsa Gabor on display in her homes: 15
8/94Estimated square feet of leaks in the concrete container housing the disabled Chernobyl reactor: 11,000
11/95Number of “Snapple enthusiasts” who attended the first Snapple Convention, held last summer in a New York suburb: 3,800
4/95Percentage of Americans whose homes are equipped with a padded toilet seat: 26
7/95Number of suburban murder-for-hire cases filed with U.S. law enforcement agencies since 1988: 1,053
7/95Estimated property damage caused in a New York suburb last spring by a man firing a slingshot from his Lincoln: $7,000
7/95Percentage change in the number of rural Americans living in mobile homes between 1980 and 1990: +52
10/96Units of public housing the federal government plans to demolish by the year 2000: 100,920
Units it plans to construct by then: 24,679
9/96Number of great crested newts a British housing developer plans to “responsibly relocate” by the end of the year: 19,000
12/98Maximum income that an Aspen, Colorado, resident may earn in order to be eligible for subsidized housing: $104,000
4/98Number of complimentary doughnuts Bob Dole receives each week as part of his Dunkin’ Donuts contract: 60
Number he distributed to reporters waiting outside Monica Lewinsky’s Watergate apartment last February 2: 48
9/98Number of years an independent counsel has been investigating Ronald Reagan’s Department of Housing: 8
11/99Number of consecutive days last spring that Michael Moore trained a camera on Lucianne Goldberg’s apartment: 45
7/00Number of U.S. counties in which a full-time minimum-wage earner can afford a one-bedroom apartment: 0
8/00Percentage of refugees from the Bosnian war who have not returned to their homes since 1995’s peace accord: 39
9/00Factor by which homeowners’ deductions claimed by Americans last year exceed the budget of HUD: 3
9/00Estimated portion of U.S. coastal homes whose plots will be obliterated by erosion by the year 2060: 1/4
1/01Ratio of public housing units built in Jewish communities in Israel since 1975 to those built in Arab communities: 337:1
4/01Blocks separating Kenneth Starr’s New York University Law School office from Monica Lewinsky’s apartment: 7
Blocks separating Lewinsky’s apartment from Bill Clinton ‘s Harlem office: 135
5/01Percentage of a U.S. home’s electrical consumption accounted for by appliances that are switched off: 5
9/01Prize awarded an Indiana University senior in April in a national “messiest college apartment” contest: $10,000
11/02Factor by which estimated homeowners’-insurance losses owing to mold have increased since 1999: 540
12/02Average number of people killed per week by a sniper operating in suburban Maryland and Virginia this fall: 3
Average number of homicides per week during the same period in Washington, D.C.: 7
12/03Estimated number of artificial Christmas trees displayed in U.S. homes each year for every real one: 2.6
11/05Percentage of homes in Orleans Parish that lacked flood insurance: 54
2/05Estimated number of Florida homeowners who signed contracts last year forbidding them to complain about their homes: 4,000
7/05Price, from a Florida company, for an RV that protects riders from biological and chemical attack: $1,200,000
9/05Number of consecutive years that the value of housing in Japan has dropped since its housing bubble burst: 14
8/06Number of single-family homes sold in the New Orleans area during the first quarter of 2006: 3,659
1/07Amount that U.S. college students spent last year on furnishings for dorm rooms and apartments: $3,800,000,000
6/07Ratio in 1985 of the number of new homes with two or fewer bedrooms to the number with four or more: 4:3
Ratio today: 1:3
6/07Chance that the buyer of a U.S. home in 2006 now has “negative equity,” i.e., the debt on the home exceeds its value: 1 in 6
6/07Percentage of CEOs of S&P 500 companies whose homes are at least 10,000 square feet or sit on more than ten acres: 13
Average percentage by which growth in their companies’ stock prices lagged behind that of CEOs with smaller homes: 7
10/08Average percentage change in median home values when the proportion of same-sex couples nearby goes up by 1 percent: +9
4/08Percentage of Americans who believe that their home is still gaining in value: 55
5/08Estimated number of 1950s suburban homes that Arizona has added to the National Register of Historic Places: 670
8/08Percentage of U.S. homeowners who reported last year that they had bought a car using a home-equity loan: 27
1/09Chance that the buyer of a U.S. home in 2006 now has “negative equity,” i.e., the debt on the home exceeds its value: 1 in 5
3/09Minimum number of U.S. homeowners whose banks improved their mortgage terms in the first quarter of last year: 73,000
Percentage of them who were a month or more behind on their payments six months after the relief: 55