sanseeing, I know my answer was not pretty but it is the one that I personally would love to be able to live by. Unfortunately it is highly unlikely that I will be able to due to family needs but IF I had unlimited time then that is the strategy I would apply.
So your question about using past prices as a reference and factoring inflation into the mix makes alot of sense. However as noone pointed out, higher inflation also means less to spend on housing as well correct? I don’t know…if you analyze it to much, you start chasing your tail and you go nowhere. I have seen some posters do something like take 2001 prices and apply a 3% appreciation rate and that may be considered reasonable. Again, hard to say what works.
In the end, for me, all I can do is make sure I buy what I can afford and will hopefully not have regrets if/when the market goes down after I buy. If I can hold off until sometime into 09 that will be better then 08 but by no means will it be the bottom.
As far as RP/RB as reasonable alternatives to Scripps… well that is in the eye of the beholder yeah? Lots of people think so. I have no problems at all with either of them but personally I like Scripps a bit better. RB/RP get the Poway school district so the nod goes to them for that category. It really is personal taste. I lived in RP for awhile and had no problems with it at all. I have lots of friends that live in both places and like them.
As for measuring the depreciation of each neighborhood to compare to each other. If I didn’t alot other work to do I would do that and post tonite… However I am gonna procrastinate by reading a few more posts, run some simulations for my other job, do some more real estate work, then go to sleep. If you want shoot me some email and I will do it in the next few days. [email protected]
