California is a very competitive state in terms of business, agriculture, economic, and pretty much everything. Living here is expensive. If you don't have a degree or skills you will end up working either a temporary job, restaurant or fast foods.

The average housing cost before 2005 was 300's and up. The condo and apartments was about 250's below, or it depends on how many bedrooms and bathrooms in the unit. We purchased our condo 3 years ago. We did not rent because we are planning someday to make it as our investment.

Before it was only me, my husband, and our dog. Now that we have a kid, we are planning to move to a bigger place. I feel like our house is getting smaller and smaller, and over crowded.

Since 2006 up to now the market was in bad shape. Thousands of houses were being foreclosed, and homeowners were kicked out from the bank. A lot of people are homeless and defend on welfare. The gas price is getting high and so as the food. I know that this is a good time to purchase a house because the market is down. The downside is our condo is worth less than what we expected. But, we came up the idea of renting our condo and buy a house.

I search houses from the internet, and some of them looks pretty in the picture. Most of these houses were beat up and falling apart. So we decided to look around some houses in the area. We made an appointment to meet a Realtor and help us to show the houses that we like. It takes few weeks to look for a house. It's not like going to a store and pick what you like and leave. It's a matter of patience.

Last week we look some houses again, and this time we found the right one. Wow! This house has a lot of potential, nice yard, nice kitchen, it has a fireplace, and the bonus....it has a built in pool. This could be our new place. So, we both agreed to make an offer to the bank.

All we need to do is wait till our realtor will contact us about the result