[photopress:180px_California_state_seal.png,thumb,alignright]I recently returned from my almost annual vacation in beautiful California to visit my family and a few famous real estate bloggers (Dustin & Andy). And it was interesting to note what I learned about real estate in the Golden State during my two weeks down there…
Non surprises
Bay Area real estate is still expensive. That wasn’t surprising at all. It’s been that way as far back I can remember. During my coffee talk w/ Andy, we discussed how the San Francisco side of bubble bay has popped, and the Oakland side is peaking.
LA traffic is still awful.
Small Surprises
Santa Barbara is even more expensive than Silicon Valley.
Camp Pendleton is the only thing separting San Diego from Los Angeles & Orange County. I hope for San Diego’s sake, the Marines stay put.
RedFin has finally invaded the Bay Area. I wonder who’s next? 😉
Bay Area traffic is catching up to LA.
Big Surprises
Home values in Southern Ventura county (home to Dustin’s new employer) are on the ridiculous side of expensive. In fact, it’s Silicon Valley expensive. I wasn’t expecting cheap prices (after all, I did grow up in California), but I wasn’t expecting this!?
I didn’t expect Santa Ynez to be as expensive as it is. Maybe Wacko Jacko’s Neverland ranch has done to Santa Ynez’s property values, what Bill Gate’s house has done to Medina’s? My parent’s home town (Santa Maria) is comparitively inexpensive, but it’s about as pricely as the Seattle Eastside is (median price ~$450K).
San Diego County is downright cheap in comparission to it’s neighbors to the north. In fact, prices there are less than 10% more expensive than Bellevue! Maybe being next to the Mexican border is keeping prices low, but I would’ve expected San Diego to be second only to Santa Barbara and the Bay Area.
So what other markets in the country (or the rest of planet earth for that matter) have surprising prices (both more expensive and less expensive than you might expect)? I’ve heard from more than one local realtor, that many out of state real estate consumers have sticker shock when they first come to King County. And I’m still surprised that Portland is so cheap compared to it’s nothern & southern big city neighbors.