This report presents data from the American Housing Survey (AHS). The survey is sponsored by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau.

The AHS is the most comprehensive national housing survey in the United States. It provides data on a wide range of housing subjects, including single-family homes, apartments, manufactured housing, vacant units, family composition, income, housing and neighborhood quality, housing costs, equipment, fuel type, and recent moves. National data are collected every 2 years from a sample of housing units. The national survey, which began in 1973, has sampled the same units since 1985; it also samples new construction to ensure continuity and timeliness of the data.

The survey, whose data are presented in this report, includes about 155,000 housing units. Respondents in the sample were interviewed between July and December 2011. Data are collected by census enumerators by telephone or personal visit via a laptop survey questionnaire. For unoccupied units, data are collected from landlords, rental agents, or neighbors.

In the past, the AHS was two surveys conducted independently of one another. The national survey was enumerated every other odd-numbered year, while the metropolitan survey occurred in selected areas on a rotating basis. Starting in 2007, the national and metropolitan surveys were conducted in the same time-period to reduce costs. Although they were collected simultaneously, the resulting data were not pooled to produce a single set of estimates. The national cases were used for regional- and national- level
estimates, while the metropolitan cases were used for specific-area estimates. These areas usually, but not always, coincide with the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) definitions of the metropolitan statistical area. There was no AHS-Metropolitan sample in the 2011 survey. Instead, a supplemental sample of housing units was selected for 29 metropolitan areas. This supplemental sample was combined with the national sample in these areas in order to produce metropolitan estimates using the national survey. The 2011 sample also includes an oversample of assisted housing units, drawn from HUD administrative records.