I think that’s more due to the relative attractiveness of the cities. London, NYC, Paris etc have become extremely expensive because they’re world cities, attracting huge amounts of people and jobs. That’s not really the case for Vienna, or Glasgow, or Riga etc
100 years ago there were 4 families in the now single apartment I live in. There was an extreme housing crisis and the current system started then as a direct response to that extreme overcrowding.
Bay Area could learn a lot from Vienna. Especially about building up.