A question or two

Lateline - 24/03/2009: US Govt plans to purge toxic assets

This segment on Lateline last night showed us one of the newly empty suburbs of America, where there are worthless "sub prime" houses the banks are happy to virtually give away.

One thing I don't understand is: where did the former occupants of these houses go? Was there an adequate rental market to absorb them immediately? You can't imagine the same thing in Australia, where housing demand is keeping rents up and vacancy down.

Another question: is there nothing much in the way of public housing in America? In Australia, I could imagine a push for governments to acquire a dirt cheap empty suburb or two as a way of boosting public housing.