In 1833 in newly rebuilt Chicago, a new type of building appeared, 'balloon frame,' that "would absorb most of the population growth of the United States over the next one hundred and fifty years". A "new structure could be erected more quickly by two men than the [European-style] heavy timber frame by twenty...[so that] many poorly paid immigrant groups had homeownership rates as high [as] white Americans." "For the first time in the history of the world, middle class families in the late nineteenth century could reasonably expect to buy a detached home on an accessible lot... the real price of shelter in the United States was lower than in the Old World."