Thanks for posting this article- as a resident of the IE myself, I appreciate seeing data/news on my region (especially since data/news on just the IE seems hard to come by).
I live in Riverside, and believe that my husband and I probably represent your slightly above average first-time home buyer- I only mean “above average” in the sense that at 24 yrs old we have quite a lot less debt than our peers, have a higher household income for our age (~ $85K), excellent credit scores, save as much as we can, and spend prudently.
If the only thing we can afford in the Inland Empire is a dilapidated shack in a neighborhood with the twice the national average crime rate, how are all these other people snapping up $400K houses? Jobs in the IE don’t pay all that well (my husband and I were lucky to have found two of the quasi-exceptions), there’s NO WAY people can afford these homes….yet the market here is still going up!
I think I’m living in a parallel universe…
Just and example of how crazy the IE is: in 1999 my mom bought a house for $92,000. She sold it in 2004 for $245,000. A few months ago, it was listed at $380,000. This house, in reality, isn’t worth more than $150,000.
If this whole bubble debacle hadn’t happened, my husband and I would have been able to buy the equivalent of what is now a $375,000-$400,000 house, for a much, much lower price.
