[quote=barnaby33]Russell, too many caveats. Sure its a great time to buy if X and Y and Z all happen to be true. Its just that for most of us, a recession means X, Y, Z aren’t.

While there may be many areas outside of SoCal that aren’t hit as badly by this recession, but whos house prices have returned to sanity, it hasn’t happened here on a grand scale.

Josh[/quote]

I guess it depends on how you define “grand scale.” As Rich has shown (and this has been noted in other media), housing affordability – generically – is as high as it’s ever been in SD. For most SFRs under $450K, it’s cheaper to own them than to rent them. (Yes, a good part of this is due to low interest rates which will certainly disappear one day.) That doesn’t mean the prices won’t continue to decline, but I think house prices – particularly at the mid- and lower-ends have mostly (“mostly” being the operative word) returned to sanity in SD. But that doesn’t mean they can’t over-correct and get even more sane.