Why are so many Californians moving to other states? (San Francisco: property taxes, housing)

[nostress13]

Where else can a six figure income not be sufficient enough to live in a great area?

[Sassberto]

Originally Posted by nostress13

Where else can a six figure income not be sufficient enough to live in a great area?

NYC, Boston, Washington DC, Paris, London,etc...

[fbf2006]

Yup...can't buy a nice enough house on a low six figure income (say 110K) around Boston, especially if you happened to go to college/grad school and had to get loans.

[nostress13]

I'm talking about the entire STATE of California.

[vfrpilot]

CA is an awfully big state. Houses are much more affordable as you move away from the coast, with a few exceptions. That is why the I-15 corridor has literally exploded with housing. From the Mexican Border up through San Diego, Riverside, and San Bernadino Counties. Palmdale and Lancaster also has 'affordable' housing. North of LA along I-5 and 99 are areas that are 'affordable'. CA is roughly 300 miles from west to east and around 700 miles from top to bottom, 156k square miles. I think you can pretty much find anything within the borders.

[renngrrl]

A 110K family income will not buy much in CA anymore unless you do a voodoo loan that will ruin you in the end. Even in "affordable" areas like Sacramento, the median price is $399k as of 2-12-07.

That right there is why people are leaving CA. If an area becomes unaffordable to the majority of it's population, it suffers systemic shock which results in all the other nastiness that we Californians talk about.

[Wisteria]

I know that NotmeOfficer posted about the Redding area. Although it is growing a bit, it still seems pretty small. And what about around Lake Shasta? Or Eureka? I have friends in northern California who own a lot of property for a cheap price. Houses are much cheaper up there, it seems, although I would think the main drawback would be the lack of jobs because the towns are smaller.

Anyone else have any good points about northern California? Southern California will always draw the rich and famous because of the weather, beauty and close proximity to the ocean. But northern California still seems in the developing stages. Does anyone else have personal knowledge about northern California?

Thanks.

[renngrrl]

North of the SF to Sacramento corridor, the employment opportunities really drop off. We get lots of retirees there because they can lock in their Prop 13 gains by staying in the CA border but don't have to worry about working.

[OCCASparky]

Originally Posted by Sassberto

NYC, Boston, Washington DC, Paris, London,etc...

You kiddin? You can live in a darn nice neighborhood in Boston for 100K. Just cause you can't afford to live in Beacon Hill....

[Sassberto]

Originally Posted by OCCASparky

You kiddin? You can live in a darn nice neighborhood in Boston for 100K. Just cause you can't afford to live in Beacon Hill....

We were there a couple years ago and looked at property. You can't forget about brutal property taxes which can add 1k a month to your housing costs. I saw a lot of 650sf 1BR's for 500k.