[joshvm]

Is slate particularly popular in the US?

In the UK most tiles are made of clay which are cheap and pretty durable. My neighbourhood is Victorian and I guarantee some of the houses here still have their original tiles. Some towns have slate roofs (e.g. the Lake District), but it's more expensive and a local aesthetic/tradition, more than anything else.

Virtually nobody uses shingle roofs. To give an idea of the historic distribution, which is still pretty accurate: http://www.buildingconservation.com/articles/claytile/pic_12...

Replacement prices, for example: https://local.which.co.uk/advice/cost-price-information-roof...

An entire slate roof on a big house is around £12k max. I'm surprised that the difference isn't that much compared to clay, but I imagine most of the cost is labour.

[EADGBE]

Depends on the style of home (Spanish, traditional, modern, etc). I see clay tile, slate, and asphalt mixed in the same neighborhood pretty frequently. Of course, the higher the home value the less likely it's going to have asphalt (or at least asphalt that looks like asphalt).