I feel your frustration. It’s a shame how little 100k gets one in terms of quality of life in SoCal. My situation is very similar to yours incomewise. We rented for 3 years before we bought during which time our savings/investment nearly doubled from 130k to 200k. I’m actually not quite sure how that happend. We’re fortunate and extremely grateful that we had considerable equity from our last house which allowed us to make a big down payment. We recently moved into a dream house (a McMansion in a great neighorhood ~20 min from work) and love it. If I were you I’d continue to rent and save/invest until you could afford a dream house. What’s the point of stretching your finances to buy something that’s NOT your dream house?
