Where do you live BikeRider? I’ve lived in Michigan, NYC, San Diego, and now Ann Arbor, Michigan (again). For years I traveled extensively throughout the US. Now that I have kids of my own, I would love to live in San Diego again and experience it through the eyes of my non-jaded children. California may be expensive and have a lot of traffic, although nowhere near the traffic of NYC. DC, or Boston. Yet San Diego certainly has a lot going for it.
I guess ownership and living somewhere are separate issues. Here in Ann Arbor a decent house is $700,000 and the Pacific and decent weather is ~2700 miles away.