oh, Y, I so know what you mean! Since I live near the beach the houses in my neighborhood are now going for $850,000 and up. And this are INCREDIBLY SMALL SHITTY HOMES. All built before 1950,so they have no central heat or air, no insulation, crappy windows, etc. Oh, and did I mention? We're right next door to a municpal airport. But what a deal! Buy this shitty house for a million dollars and listen to airplanes for the rest of your life!
California real estate sucks.

I really hate to add salt to the wound, but this is one example of the type of home you could gete here for only 25 grand less.
http://tours.tourfactory.com/tours/tour.asp?t=219676&home=www.homedebut.com&slink=1&gg=55&tt=4&aa=&oh=&sReferer=http://www.homedebut.com/search.asp&sReferer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Ehomedebut%2Ecom%2Fsearch%2Easp
I now know whay so many Californians move up here.

It really does. I say move to Portland! My parents sold their house in LA when I was a teenager, and were able to pay cash for the one they bought in Eugene, with 1/2 of what they made off of it left over. The really big, crazy beautiful houses up here sell for around $300K and we're talking fantastic neighbourhoods! But still, you can even find stuff for as low as $150K in fairly decent neighbourhoods. P-town rocks.

-H

No kidding. My boyfriend and I have been talking about buying house here in CA. Unfortunately, he is in the wine business, so that means we need to live near the wine country. I am in graduate school. There is no way we could ever afford a house out there (average cost: $600,000 for an average 2 bedroom home). We both get awfully depressed when we talk about the prospects of ever owning our own home.

Honestly, our new motto is, "Look out Oregon! Here we come!"

I live in Davis, a small, inland, college town where houses are going for $600,000 to $1,000,000. Who buys these houses?!?!

California home prices just make me ill. Rentals do too. My brother-in-law is finally breaking down and moving here to Spokane because currently he rents a 2-bedroom apartment in an iffy neighborhood for nearly 3,000 a month. In our neighborhood, there is a beautiful, brand new split-level house for rent for $895.

I hear Texas is nice. :o)

prices in the DC area are just as bad. a decent 4 bedroom house in a nice neighborhood will cost you at least $800,000. i have no idea who can afford those houses, but i'm certainly not one of those people! hence the reason i live in a small town that has reasonable realestate prices :)

Great Blog and a very, very cute kid.

I hear your song of woe. It's even worse in Los Angeles. You never saw my house (rental) but it would sell for a million dollars and it's in "the hood" where the public schools are so terrible it would be impossible to send your children to them (so that's another $18,000 a year per child). MO FO. I don't know what we're going to do once the boys are old enough to go to school. As it is we are paying over $6,000 a year for preschool (half day) and I won't even tell you our rent.

Sigh. It is very depressing. The good news for you though, is that unlike me, you don't HAVE TO live where you live to make a living (or Tony rather). You could move if you wanted to. We can't without starting ALL OVER and at our ages that's a daunting prospect.

Wow. That is crazy. You might want to move to a different area, if you can. If you want to really buy a house. Hard to know exactly what you've got there, but a house similar to that in my "hood" would probably be around 100,000. I think real estate is going up crazy everywhere, but wow. I feel so lucky all of a sudden. Of course, I live No WHERE near the ocean.

I think don't think renting is bad though. In fact, in some ways it's a lot better than owning.

its so depressing. These white trash neighbors down the street from us are selling their 3 bedroom house...$1.4 MILLION. Can you even believe it? Southern California is outrageous. Its the school district they're paying for (its not L.A.U.S.D thank God) but still. My husband and I feel like we're going to rent FOREVER with no chance of buying a decent place within a good school district.

This is precisely why I am moving away from SF to Atlanta in 3 weeks. As a single woman with a decent but non-spectacular job/salary, I'll be able to buy my own house there within a year. My whole family is actually considering making an exodus out of CA. My parent's house, which they bought for 50k, is now worth over 600k. Ridiculous.

All the non-natives ruined it for us born and raised CA people.

I live in FL and prices here are going crazy also. Average home price has gone from $200,000 to $300,000 in the past few years!

I hear ya, girl. Until my vacation earlier this month, I had never even considered owning a home. It's such a pipe dream that it wasn't even worth fantasizing about. Ranked right up there with owning a Maserati.

Then I went to Ely, NV, and saw a five-bedroom house with the basement finished and turned into a full, two-bedroom apartment. The listing price was $169,000. You can't buy a carport for that in California. I am SO moving out of here.

I too feel your pain. We bought our first house here in FL for $52,900. It wasn't a palace but it wasn't a dump either just your average 3/2. We have sold the house just to get out of it and moved south. We too are going to be life long renters you can't get a house for under $200k in my neighborhood. I don't understand how the peeps in my hood do it they live and work in the same town I do I know I can't afford a mortgage payment, hell I can barely make rent for that matter. Check into government programs. We are trying to get approved for a down payment assistance program that helps people in "our" situations. Sad part is that I thought my husband and I had pretty good income but after completeing the finacial paperwork I realized that we are considered Low Income? Just a sign of the times.

I can't begin to understand how much you would need to make to afford to spend that much for a house. Try the midwest...prices are still reasonable here. We bought 10 acres with a pond and nice house for approx. $125,000. Since I have money left over...how much for an hour with Tony? Ok maybe just 1/2 hour! ;-)

Don't I know it.

I understand now why my mother spent so much of my childhood buying lottery tickets.

I will be at a Starbucks halfway between my place and yours, crying into my latte.

It's the same way here too. If I ever want a place of my own I'll have to move out to the boonies...and that will NEVER happen.

All I can say is ... MOVE! The world is full of lots of beautiful affordable places to live.

Y

With #4 graduating June 10th and off to San Francisco State we are desparately trying to find a house to buy somewhere within an HOUR's commute for hubby (his one way commute from where we live, right next to you, is 2+hours) and the housing prices are insane. INSANE.

I wish we could move out of the area, hell, out of state, but my elderly parents live in Brea, hubby's in San Diego and we feel we need to be within easy driving distance if they need us.

Argh.

California housing prices are beyond ridiculous. It is scary.

me, too!

looked at a house near my parents. victorian home. two stories. gorgeous. on 2 city lots.

price? under $70K

we are so outta here in 2 years. i can't take it anymore.

i know you have family here, though, and want to stay in Cali. i don't blame you. but i hate the real estate market. i'll never own a home here, unless someone GIVES IT TO ME!

((HUGS))
I have given up on my dream of moving back to California. Two weeks ago, we bought a house in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It's beautiful out here, but the housing is getting ridiculous out here. Where we moved from in Arizona, tiny little houses with no yards are going for as much, if not MORE than what we paid for ours here. It's ridiculous!