Wonder if the cost of living in Seattle has caught up to San Diego? (Starbuck: real estate)

[beenhereandthere]

Think it's safe to say, that (hopefully not), Seattle won't be like LA, Orange County or the Bay Area for Cost of Living, but based on rents, housing prices and an economy that's doing very well in the Central Corridor and the Eastside, the COL has seemingly caught up to the San Diego area (at least 25 miles from each other's downtown)?
You don't have to go as far out in Seattle, like you may have to in San Diego to find something that's cheaper, but other than that? San Diego, isn't a corporate town like Seattle is and maybe as of recently, has a similar population growth rate.
I just say to myself, how bittersweet that is, shows how popular the Seattle area is getting, but the COL being the same as the town with probably the best weather in the USA (Seattle may have above average weather, that's only due to very little snow though).

[Seattle206723]

What you really need to do is look up the Growth Management Act! This is the Nail in the coffin as the city grows and will assure that those prices are reality like LA.

There was a study done by the UW Real Estate | UW study: Rules add $200,000 to Seattle house price | Seattle Times Newspaper that will start to get you bellow the top of the Rigged housing market.

I can assure you this; if there was a real true free market in Seattle. The prices wouldn't be $350K for a 2 Bed room apartment/ condo right off of S Jackson and 25th ave S, around the corner from the Starbucks at the corner.

I remember when you could buy a house in that neighborhood for $100K in the 90's now they are asking $350 - 425K. Now back in the 80s they were going for 30k-50K. The COL has went up by 1000% in a very short cycle in the city; and its all due to the mentioned and verifiable link I posted above.


The State and King County is managed to keep the prices high. If you drive down I-5 and look to your left and right outside of the city of Seattle what do you see? Open fields of Trees and Cleared Areas all over the place. Look between West Seattle Exit, and all the way down to the Tukwilla Exit. With the exception of the Grotesque land/Airfield for private use owned by the Boeing Field people.

Imagine for a moment if builders were allowed to build communities there?

Imagine if the growth management act was voted away?

Imagine buying a 1700^2 home 2 car garage for $135K Just out side Seattle. That's what would happen if the two things I suggested would happen. The lions share of the Regulation and price fixing is in that regulation.

Besides I got good sources in the County and City Gov!

[Hemlock140]

It's interesting that the stated intention of the growth management act was to prevent sprawl, for environmental reasons, reducing commutes. The idea was infill rather than expanding the "urban boundaries." The effect has been the clogging of surface streets and arterials, and create choke points on freeway ramp areas, and of course, to drive up prices.