May be writing an online column for Realtytimes and need some feedback from you here. It may also go on my homepage for June.

Going to try and incorporate incomes with the cost of living in the Greater Sacramento area. Then try to relate that to the Bay Area and a potential housing market halt.

Basically want to know where homeowners would be if they didn't decide to buy a home when they did? I know Matt, Mike, Paul, Dan and a few others here have been homeowners for sometime or managed to jump on the wagon at a decent time. Some may have taken the equity out of their last home towards another home? Whatever....

Also want to know where non-homeowners stand as far as ever being able to purchase a home in the Greater Sacramento Area. Is it even an option?

Given the fact the housing market has increased ~21% every year since 2001 (except last year at ~12%), I'm wondering if your income has increased also?

So at what point do you consider quality of life more important than living in Sacramento? Would you rather have 2-3 blue-collar jobs that are necessary for the Sacramento area to function, or have 1 blue-collar job in Boise, Idaho with a lower mortgage and higher quality of life?

For example, my Father recently went through a 2nd divorce a few months ago. I tried to qualify him for a nice condo here in Elk Grove. Given the fact he was family I went absolutely rock-bottom regarding fees, etc. I tried to squeeze $1475-$1600 monthly payments out of a $300,000+++ condo. Still no dice. It wasn’t because he couldn’t qualify... it was because his pay has remained constant since 2001 with zero hope of increasing. He would have been living paycheck to paycheck. But if he was working in the Bay Area his paycheck would have reflected his cost of living more appropriately.

 

for 2003 and 2004 i got a 3% increase in pay, for 2005 i got a 5% increase in pay. If i had to buy a home now, I probably wouldn't be able to, or would end up with a much smaller home in a worse area.

 

Thanks for the figures, Russ. Anyone else?

 

I lived in Fairfield for a year, could never have hoped to own a home. My pay has remained the same for the four years I've been back in CA. Moved to Sac 3yrs ago bought a home after a year, have loads of equity. Very little debt is the only way I can afford my payments. I got a rock bottom rate though 30yr fixed 5.25%! I could never hope to own a home if I were to try to buy one now. I'd have to live in Pollock Pines in a double wide if I wanted to buy.

 

Actually if my freind wasn't a realtor (gifted me his %) and my brother hadn't loaned me a few g's I'd still be in an apartment.

 

Thanks Deyes. This is what I assumed but needed to hear.

 

Salty,

Sorry to barge in, but would you recommend buying if Elk Grove or Roseville. I am looking to purchase a home in the Elk Grove area as a 1st choice. Belavida to be exact.

 

My pay has gone up 3% - 5% per year since we purchased our house. We're really lucky that we purchased when we did - our house has gone up $200,000 in value, and there's no way we'd be able to buy a house now at the current prices. As it is, it has taken us 3 years to get comfortable with our house payment and buying a new house new would put us around $2500 - $3500 a month just for the mortgage

If we didn't already own a home, I'm not sure what we'd do. Probably look at moving out of state to an area where we could afford a home, though I don't know for sure. Probably be renting for the time being, until we figured out what we wanted to do long term.

 

If you can qualify I say go for it. If you need assistance my wife mainly deals with the 95757/95758 zipcodes as a realtor. We'd be happy to get you into any part of Elk Grove or provide you MLS information, most recent listings, etc.

Have you checked with Belavida as far as waiting lists are concerned?

 

Thanks for your input, Matt. So it's safe to say that these prices are running the lower to middle class out of town with the exception of those that already invested.

 

We just got lucky. We were offered the last one they had in line. I wish I knew you were in that area before. They just released the pricing on the next phase and the house we are looking at just went up another $7,000 in less than 4 weeks and it doesn't even have a foundation yet. Just crazy!

 

Thats how its becoming in Reno too. $350,000 for a 2,000 sq. ft. fix'r'upper or a brand new tract home for $400,000 - $1/2mil.

Its insane. I haven't worked long enough to give you an idea of raises versus prices of houses, but prices are way too high right now compared to salaries. For now, I'll have to keep renting because I can't afford a $2k+/month mortgage on my own.

To me it seems like you needed to have bought previous to about a year ago. Right now its a realtors market, neither a buyers nor a sellers market.

 

-J-, So I take it you didn't jump on it? I'm confused. What is it you want to do exactly or have you already done it?

If you haven't already acted and are out of the area my wife is willing to physically go over to anywhere in 95757 and take pictures, get information, etc. And if you need financing I’d be happy to help you with that. Whatever you need, my friend.

 

It's unfair. Thanks for the post.

 

Salty,

Sorry I was not very detailed. We did make a deposit on the home. We are just trying to find the best way for the financing. It may be the end of my having a Subaru for now though. My bugeye will be on sale soon I think.