We sold in SF Bay Area and moved to Alaska in summer, 2005. We missed the perfect selling window by a month or two, but made a nominal $400K profit selling the little house with a view I bought in 1991. We didn’t bank all our profits, but bought a 2x larger house with a spectacular mountain/glacier view in a very nice neighborhood for $240K less than our prior sale price. The kids love our neighborhood, the schools are good, and it has been a good move all in all. I still miss California (I’m a 4th generation native), and we may eventually return (you don’t know how important sunshine is to your mental health until you do without for a month or so).
Interestingly, there is much more inventory of houses for sale here than when we bought two years ago.
