Surprised at you Piggs, blaming it all on land prices, permits and big bad CA government. Real estate is a regional business. This bubble is regional in many regards. Speculation in downtown San Diego, for example, results in skyrocketing real estate in — you guessed it, Antarctica. Not.
There are absolutely pockets in TX where prices got ahead of values. On balance, they didn’t appreciate as much as “Canary in the Coalmine” San Diego, and won’t suffer the same declines as a result. Compare with the S&L speculation and collapse in the 80’s which absolutely hammered the midwest. I can remember parts of Oklahoma with near ‘ghost towns’ due to S&L problems and the collapsing of oil prices (and associated speculation). Coastal regions were certainly affected, but less so.
