>why is the housing crisis still persistent in NYC and Chicago Using Google data, New York has a land area of 783.8 km^2, where as SF has 121.4 km^2. New York has around 10 times the population of SF, with around 5.5 times the area. Yes New York has a housing supply issue, but it's able to host twice the density. Housing would always be a problem in a place that's desirable to live, but NY is much better at meeting that demand than SF.