The suburbs have greater population growth, but urban areas are now growing at a faster pace than during the years of the housing bubble.

Asking prices in urban neighborhoods are rising only slightly faster than in the suburbs, and the suburbs actually have higher population growth, according to the Trulia (TRLA) Price Monitor and Rent Monitor.

The two monitors measure asking prices and rents, and adjust for the changing mix of listed homes. Because asking prices lead sales prices by approximately two or more months, the Monitors reveal trends before other price indexes do.

Asking home prices continued to rise at the start of the spring housing season despite the drop in investor purchases.

Asking prices rose 1.2% nationally in March 2014 compared to March 2013. Asking prices rose 2.9% from February to March 2014, seasonally adjusted, reflecting three straight months of solid month-over-month gains.

Asking prices year-over-year are up 10% nationally, and up in 97 of the 100 largest metros. Albany, N.Y.; Hartford, Conn., and New Haven, Conn., are the only three large metros where prices fell year-over-year, albeit slightly.

The report shows that the construction boom in single-family homes during the housing bubble was centered in the suburbs, and the subsequent bust was particularly painful in many of those same suburban areas, according to Jed Kolko, economist for Trulia.

As for whether there is more of a post-housing bust switch to a preference for urban living in dense, walkable neighborhoods versus quiet, traditional suburbs, it’s vague.

The change in median price per square foot was a bit higher in urban neighborhoods (9.8%) than in suburban neighborhoods (9.4%).

Household growth, conversely, was higher in suburban neighborhoods (1.1%) than in urban neighborhoods (0.9%) over the past year.

“Suburbs can have faster household growth but smaller price gains because it’s easier to build new housing in suburbs than in dense urban neighborhoods, and new construction accommodates population growth while taking pressure off rising prices,” Kolko said.

As to why despite the apparent resurgence of interest in urban living, the suburbs have been growing faster, Kolk offers three reasons that you can read when you click below.

Although the suburbs have been growing faster, why does it seem like big cities have had a bigger part in the housing recovery?

Here are Kolko’s three reasons:

1. Hyper-urbanism

In high-rise neighborhoods, home prices rose 11.4% year-over-year, faster than urban neighborhoods overall and faster than suburban neighborhoods. These hyper-urban neighborhoods – which include much of Manhattan, Chicago’s Loop, and downtown Boston and downtown San Francisco – are highly visible but, in fact, make up a very small share of urban neighborhoods. Most urban neighborhoods look more like Brooklyn than Manhattan, or more like San Francisco’s Inner Richmond than the Financial District.

2. Builders like cities more

The construction recovery has been disproportionately urban. In 2013, apartment building construction hit a 15-year high, even though single-family home construction is still considerably below normal levels. That means many dense cities where much of the housing stock is comprised of rental apartments, including New York, Boston, and San Francisco, have been having a construction boom relative to their local normal level of construction.

3. It's where the people are moving

Population growth in urban areas has rebounded in recent years after falling during the housing boom. Census population estimates show that the most urban counties – which we define as those in the top quartile by household density (that is, most households per square mile of land area; see note #3 below) – grew by 0.8% between 2012 and 2013, after growing less than 0.2% in the boom years of 2003-2006. Still, this top quartile of highest-density counties – which includes all five New York City boroughs, San Francisco, the District of Columbia, Los Angeles, and others – grew more slowly than the second-most dense quartile of counties, which includes suburban counties of large metros as well as the main counties of smaller, lower-density metros, such as Rockland County, NY, and Contra Costa and Riverside counties in California

“Although home prices and population are growing fastest in hyper-urban high-rise neighborhoods, asking prices are rising only slightly faster in urban neighborhoods as a whole than in suburban neighborhoods. Furthermore, population is growing faster in the suburbs than urban neighborhoods overall, despite the fast growth in high-rise neighborhoods,” Kolko said. “The densest counties don’t have the fastest growing population, but they’re growing a lot faster than they did during the housing boom, when lower-density counties grew considerably faster. Population growth since the housing bust has slowed most in the bottom quartile of counties, which are largely rural areas, not suburbs.”

In short, the suburbs are far from over.