5 most (and least) affordable housing markets

Median home price: $85,000
Median income: $55,900
Affordability score: 93.8%

With the auto industry on a modest rebound, Detroit's housing market should start to stabilize. But with 14% unemployment, that could still be a ways off.

Very few people are moving into the area. Since the 2000 census, the metro area population has declined by more than 1.1%. The shrinkage was especially dramatic in the area's inner core of Detroit, Dearborn, Livonial, where the count fell nearly 7%.

That leaves a lot of home sellers searching for buyers and dropping their prices to bargain-basement levels.

Detroit also has the biggest foreclosure problem in the nation, outside the bubble markets of California, Arizona, Florida and Nevada. There were more than 47,000 foreclosure filings during the first half of the year, one for every 40 homes. Many of those homes are repossessed and put back on the already oversupplied housing market.

All that has resulted in some of the lowest home prices for any major city; the average home in the area sells for well under $60,000. Meanwhile, many of the people lucky enough to have jobs, especially in the auto industry, make very decent salaries. That makes homeownership for Motown's working people very affordable.

NEXT: Fourth place: Youngstown, Ohio