With difficulty... just ask Daniel Neuman.
The affordability thing is somewhat relative - for example, the Salinas area
(my old
hometown) is an agricultural area ("The Nation's Salad Bowl"), so the median
income is
skewed down by the large percentage of relatively low-paying agricultural jobs
in the
area. The Santa Cruz area (which is definitely NOT in the Silicon Valley - and
the folks
who live there will be the first to tell you so... ) is a tourism economy
(fairly
seasonal) and a bedroom community for the Silicon Valley. Housing is actually
more
expensive over the hill in the Silicon Valley (San Jose, Santa Clara,
Sunnyvale, Cupertino
etc.), up the Peninsula, San Francisco and in the East Bay, but the median
income is
higher, so they show up in the ratings as "more affordable" -HA!
On the flip side, no one in this part of the country has ever had to shovel the
snow out
of their driveway before driving to work in the morning, summer weather may get
pretty hot
for a few days at a time in the summer (low to mid 90s), but when it's hot, the
humidity
is low, and the sea breeze always kicks in after a couple of days of high
temperatures and
it cools off. Tornadoes and hail are very infrequent occurrences, and I've
never seen hail
larger than a pea (no dented cars or broken windows).
...and those pesky earthquakes only happen every few decades - and they scare
away the
non-natives, making more room for the rest of us!
Gary McCormick
San Jose, CA
"David A. Fox" wrote:
> CALIFORNIA PRICEY PLACE TO LIVE
> A new survey done by the National Association of Home
> Builders confirms something that many people in California
> have known for a long time ... nine of the 10 most
> expensive cities in the country are in that state. The
> builders' group says that San Francisco, though, no longer
> tops the least-affordable city list. Now it's Santa Cruz,
> about 90 minutes to the south, in the Silicon Valley.
> The Santa Cruz metro area's median income is about $65,000.
> The median home price is $420,000. San Francisco is now
> second. Third is the Salinas metro area in Monterey County.
> By the way, the Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce is
> thrilled with the latest list. Of all the major urban
> areas in the country, the Indiana capital city is the most
> affordable.
>
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