That is tough in San Diego – I rent a small 2 bedroom apartment and that alone puts me above the 1/5th line – I choose to live in Encinitas, but my rent is only 1500 – so I would have to net 7500/month or 90K/year to meet that requirement – I hopefully will get to that point in another year or two, but I am not there yet.
Yes, I could live in a less expensive area of San Diego, but I work in Encinitas, so the cost of driving/commuting would increase to move and the rent would not be thast much lower. I looked around the last time my lease was up and there was just not anything really worth moving for that would save any money over what we have.
I am married with children, so we do need at least 2 bedrooms, and as someone pointed out earlier, young children cost a lot – my wife stays home with them. My point is not to complain, we choose to live in a smaller place in a nicer area so we can save some money and try to get ahead. It was also important to us for my wife to stop working and stay home with our children until they go to school. It makes things tighter financially, but it was important to us, so we have put ourselves in a position to make that happen while still remaining financially responsible.
I mostly just wanted to point out that to meet the 1/5th of your net income to housing is tough in San Diego for anyone not making over 100K per year – and since the median household income in San Diego is around 70K – that means a lot of people here are pretty much out of luck. Of course anyone who bought prior to 2000 or so has no problem with this assuming they have not refinanced…