PD&R maintains a number of housing-related databases. To increase awareness of the availability of these data, PD&R has compiled The Guide to PD&R Data Sets, which can be downloaded from the HUD USER web site.¹⁰ The guide describes 13 available housing data resources and provides web links to related documents and datasets. Each dataset is provided with basic information, such as the source, geographic coverage, period covered, web address, background, intended users, and intended use. These important components of metadata will enable researchers to find the data quickly and easily. The following is a brief synopsis of these data sources.

The Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) database contains information on over 16,600 projects and nearly 710,000 housing units placed in service nationwide between 1987 and 1998. Geographic data for each housing project include its address, census tract, city, county, metropolitan area, and state. The Qualified Census Tracts dataset contains information on tracts that are qualified for the low-income housing tax credit based on the 1990 census data. The dataset covers all of the United States. The Difficult Development Areas dataset, also a national dataset, includes information on areas where incomes are substantially lower than housing costs. The data are broken down by state, the metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs), and non-MSAs.

The American Housing Survey (AHS) includes two datasets. The national dataset is a nationally drawn sample of 60,700 housing units covering 878 counties and independent cities throughout the United States. The data provide detailed information on housing conditions as well as characteristics of householders, such as apartments, mobile homes, family composition, income, and neighborhood quality. Geographic indicators for each housing unit include the census region and whether it is in a central city, suburb, or non-metropolitan area. AHS’s metropolitan sample includes some 5,000 housing units from 47 metropolitan areas. The smallest geographic area identified for each unit is the zone. Zones are groups of census tracts where at least 100,000 persons live.

The Property Owners and Managers Survey (POMS) was designed to provide information about the cost and availability of rental housing and what motivates owners to rent out their property to tenants. Although a nationwide survey was conducted, the final POMS dataset includes locational

Front Matter (R1-R14)

Executive Summary (1-16)

1. Introduction (17-28)

2. Ensuring the Availability, Accuracy, and Relevance of Urban and Housing Data (29-50)

3. Data Disseminaton and Software Tools (51-68)

4. Research and Policy Development (69-92)

5. The Role of Partnerships (93-106)

References (107-112)

Appendix A: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members (113-118)

Appendix B: Workshop Agenda (119-122)

Appendix C: Other Contributors (123-126)

Appendix D: Acronym List (127-128)