Women have broken through the “glass ceiling” in the homeowners association field. But in at least nine major cities, according to a new report, they are all but shut out from buying homes themselves.

A study by real estate data firm PropertyShark and its sister company, RENTCafe, found that the housing gender gap persists in nine major cities, including Chicago, Seattle and Denver. In those markets, single men can afford to buy or rent a starter home -- but, due to the gender wage gap, single women cannot. (A starter home, for the purposes of this study, was defined as either a studio or one-bedroom residence -- whether apartment, condo or house.)

Even worse, 14 markets were found to be so expensive that neither single men nor women could afford the average mortgage payment on a typical first residence. Manhattan, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Boston topped that list.

In the most expensive markets, the monthly payments on a starter house would command “upwards of 80 percent” of a woman’s median income, the study said. In places where men can take the first step onto the housing ladder but women can’t even get a toehold, the payments would exceed 30 percent of the median women’s income.

The median income for single women was considerably less than men’s in all 50 cities covered in the research.

There’s no such divide in the homeowners association field, according to the Community Associations Institute (CAI). The group provides resources to homeowners and professionals in more than 338,000 community, condominium and co-operative associations in the United States.

Women not only hold the majority of positions on the CAI’s leadership roster; many also lead organizations in the community association field that work with multi-million-dollar budgets. And according to the latest research, their salaries are on par with their male counterparts.

“From entry level to executive, there are no barriers in our industry for women to achieve great things,” says Cat Carmichael, chair of CAI’s 2017 Business Partners Council.

The home-building business is still dominated by small shops that build only a few houses a year. But last year, big builders -- both national and regional -- grabbed their largest share of the market since 2010.

In 2016, the 10 largest publicly traded builders captured a combined 27.4 percent share of the 559,000 single-family home closings. D.R. Horton alone nailed more than 40,300 deals, giving it a 7.2 percent share of the market. By comparison, the 10th largest company, Toll Bros., closed 6,100 houses for a 1.1 percent share.

Public companies enjoy several advantages over their smaller counterparts. They have better access to less-expensive credit, the lifeblood of the business, through the capital markets. And they can buy building products in bulk for their numerous projects.

But small builders have their own skills. For one thing, they are a lot more nimble and can move quickly if their markets change. They also tend to be much more flexible in their ability to customize their houses to meet local demands and preferences.

Here are the top 10 home builders for 2016: their number of closings and their shares of the market.

-- D.R. Horton: 40,309, 7.2 percent

-- Lennar: 26,563, 4.8 percent

-- Pulte Home: 19,95, 3.6 percent

-- NVR: 14,928, 2.7 percent

-- CalAtlantic: 14,229, 2.5 percent

-- KB Homes: 9,829, 1.8 percent

-- Taylor Morrison: 7,369, 1.3 percent

-- Meritage: 7,355, 1.3 percent

-- Hovnanian: 6,712, 1.2 percent

-- Toll Bros.: 6,098, 1.1 percent

According to Trulia, the inventory of houses for sale nationally hit a record low in the first quarter of 2017, falling 5.1 percent over the last 12 months. That makes it eight consecutive quarters that inventory has stumbled, putting upward pressure on asking prices.

Looking at the housing stock nationally and in the 100 largest U.S. metropolitan areas, Trulia found that the decline was most pronounced in the starter home category, which fell 8.7 percent from the first quarter of 2016 to Q1 2017.

Over the same period, the number of trade-up places listed for sale dropped 7.9 percent. At the same time, the inventory of premium houses slipped 1.7 percent.

“The persistent and disproportional drop in starter and trade-up home inventory is pushing affordability further out of reach,” the Trulia report said. “Starter and trade-up homebuyers need to spend 2.9 percent and 1.6 percent more of their income, respectively, than they did at this time last year.”

Las Vegas hotelier Steve Wynn has discovered the next great amenity. And with it, he plans to bring to the desert the one thing the Nevada gambling mecca lacks: Caribbean-like beaches.

Wynn plans to turn the 38-acre golf course behind his two hotels on the Las Vegas strip into a huge Crystal Lagoon where visitors can not only swim and sun on white sand beaches, but also water-ski, paddleboard and paraglide.

“This is the most fun project I’ve had in my 45 years (in the industry),” Wynn says. “I love this.”

Crystal Lagoons are popping up elsewhere, too. Several are under construction in Florida, as is one in Dallas and another in Houston. In total, the company has some 300 lagoons either built or in development in more than 50 countries, including 15 in the U.S.

“This is a complete game-changer in terms of amenities,” Greg Singleton, president of the Metro Development Group, said at an Urban Land Institute conference last fall in Dallas. “It’s almost like being on a beach in the Bahamas, with crystal-clear water in front of you, except there are no jellyfish, man o' wars or sharks.”

Crystal Lagoons bills itself as a technology company that offers developers a system for building and maintaining bodies of water of unlimited size, in clear condition, at a low cost. And it can help turn landlocked, otherwise non-viable properties into successful projects, says the company’s U.S. president, Uri Man.

“This is an amenity that has the power to change the real estate paradigm,” Man says. “It can transform any location into an idyllic beach paradise and provides real estate developers unmatched value compared to traditional amenities.”

Crystal Lagoons was started in Chile by developer Fernando Fischmann, whose project was on a part of the coastline where the water was bitterly cold and had large waves and dangerous undercurrents. Swimming was prohibited.

To overcome these problems, he dreamed of creating a massive pool that would offer visitors the opportunity to swim and enjoy water sports in a safe and clean environment. After several fits and starts, Fischmann, a trained biochemist, came up with the right formula, and the company was born. Today, it holds some 1,500 patents in 60 countries.

While the lagoons can be of any size and depth -- “there are no limitations,” says Man -- they are typically three to 10 acres in size and eight to 10 feet deep. They have shallow ends that are child-friendly and deeper spots for all kinds of water sports.

Egypt currently boasts the largest lagoon, at 30 acres, but a 90-acre lagoon is under construction in Dubai. In the U.S., a 14-acre lagoon being built in Jacksonville, Florida, will anchor a new single-family community of 1,000 homes and a 100,000 square-foot waterfront retail and restaurant village.

For proprietary reasons, the company won’t talk much about how the lagoons are built. But they are excavated similarly to man-made lakes, and have liners similar to above-ground swimming pools. The liner is made of a material than can withstand the sun’s UV rays and doesn’t deteriorate. “It can last over 100 years,” according to Man.

Whereas conventional pools use high levels of chlorine and other disinfectants, Crystal Lagoons distribute tiny amounts, and only as needed, via a system of sensors and "pulses." They also use super-efficient ultrasonic filtration systems.

The lagoons use 30 times less water than a golf course of the same size, and can be filled with any type of water, including saltwater. One Cabo San Lucas lagoon contains 27 million gallons of sea water diverted from the Pacific. By the time it reaches the lagoon, it is clean and clear.

The first U.S. lagoon is being built by the Metro Development Group at a property in Wesley Chapel, Florida. Before breaking ground in February, the company already had more than 2,000 names on its waiting list, all with only a billboard on Interstate 75. Singleton attributes the numbers to interest in the property’s nearly 8-acre lagoon, which will feature a private beach, swim-up bar, grotto and kayak launch. Metro has also signed deals to build lagoons in three other Florida locations.

Kent Donahue of Bayside Land Partners in Dallas is also sold on the amenity.

"It’s what we are basing our entire theme around,” he said. “We feel it’s going to really be a showcase.”

Developers like Singleton and Donahue are high on Crystal Lagoons because they can sell lots at a faster clip and at higher prices to builders, who, in turn, can sell their houses more quickly and at higher prices. And they can do it on sites that otherwise have no water features other than a conventional pool or two.

“We are able to drive higher lot prices because builders know their absorption rates are going to be quicker and their prices are going to be higher,” said John Kinney, owner/manager of Twin Creek Development Associates in Houston. At the Florida property, builder D.R. Horton has raised its prices four times on houses that would cost $30,000 less elsewhere, according to Crystal Lagoons’ Man.

Man says demand for the technology has been strong because it offers unprecedented value at a very low construction and maintenance cost. And in the process, it offers homebuyers a healthy, active lifestyle in a fun, safe environment.

With more and more young couples buying houses together before committing to each other in marriage, it's paramount for them to understand the way they are seen financially.

For example, co-habitating is not the same as co-borrowing. Neither is co-borrowing the same as co-owning.

Let’s start with that last one, because it trips up lots of people. Borrowing together creates a joint liability. If one of you fails to pay his or her share of the mortgage, the other is responsible for the entire payment. And if the couple eventually splits up, both parties are liable for the full amount of the loan.

But borrowing together has nothing to do with owning together. Ownership is determined by how you take the title -- something most buyers don’t even think about until they get to the closing table.

Probably the best way for unrelated co-borrowers to hold the title is as tenants-in-common, where each borrower owns a specific interest in the property. (Caveat: None of this should be considered legal advice. It is always best to seek counsel with an attorney well-versed in real estate matters.) Typically, each owner would take a 50 percent share. But the shares could be different -- say, 60-40 -- depending on how much each buyer contributes to the down payment or how much of the monthly payment each is responsible for. If the borrowers should eventually marry, they can change their ownership arrangement.

The major advantage of tenants-in-common is that in the event of a breakup, each owner can sell or pass his or her interest to whomever he or she desires, generally without the consent of the other owner. That means, though, that one of you could end up owning the house with a total stranger.

Another drawback: If the split is less than amicable, one owner can file a “partition” lawsuit against the other if that owner is unwilling to sell. The court can then order a sale, with the proceeds split among all owners according to their ownership shares.

When it comes to financing, two unrelated buyers should not assume they have to co-borrow to buy a home. Indeed, each can borrow separately as a single person and pool the proceeds.

“Sometimes two incomes are not better than one,” according to the folks at New American Funding, an independent mortgage company headquartered in Tustin, California.

But many people do choose to co-borrow: combining their finances to qualify for a more expensive house and larger loans. After all, co-borrowing provides a second source of repayment, which is always appealing to your lender.

It also could improve your debt-to-income ratio, which could qualify you for a lower interest rate. But if the extra income comes with extra debt, it could have the opposite effect. In other words, despite the higher overall combined income, the terms offered by your lender could be less attractive.

Co-buyers also should understand that even though their incomes and assets are combined, their credit scores are not. Consequently, if one borrower has a far better score than the other, the lender will evaluate their application based on the lower score, New American Funding explained in a recent blog post.

In that case, the company suggests that the buyers wait to take out a loan until the borrower with the lower score takes steps to improve it. Another possibility is for the borrower with the higher score to seek financing on his or her own. Of course, the first option means a delay of at least a few months, and the second option probably means the couple won’t be able to buy as large a home.

If you are buying with a family member or a friend, neither of whom is going to actually occupy the house, it may make sense for that person to co-sign for the loan rather than serve as a co-borrower. A co-signer agrees to be held responsible for paying the mortgage if the other signer fails to do so.

On the downside, though, having a co-signer could change the all-important debt-to-income ratio for the worse, causing the lender to require a larger down payment. 

The bottom line: Unmarried buyers should take a few extra steps outside the loan process to ensure they are defining and protecting their own legal rights. They should seek legal counsel to draw up a co-habitation agreement that sets out each person’s rights and responsibilities.

Probably most importantly, they should decide, before moving in, how their housing partnership should be dissolved if they split up down the road. It is always better to address that possibility with cool heads and clear thinking, rather than later, when the once-happy duo might be disengaging with anger and animosity.

Don't rely on the notion that you will "always be friends." Rather, take concrete steps: Address how you will dissolve your deal while you still like each other. That way, if you do part ways, you might actually do so as buddies.