Might move to Phoenix... or Bay area. Thoughts on living there?

[Small_words]

Alright, it looks like the job search has expanded to include the Bay area, which quite honestly is a bit overwhelming. As mentioned before, my wife works for Southwest and would be based out of Oakland. I would be working in Fairfield for the AF Reserve. So, the issue is where within 45 mins of both to look. Any experience? I looked at house prices last night and they were insane. $500,000 for a piece of crap fixer-upper in pre-foreclosure on a 3,300 sf lot in Walnut Creek. Is that place just expensive and Concord or Martinez are reasonable? There are just too many options to look at and I would really appreciate everyone's two cents.

Phoenix isn't out, the wifey is just concerned about our baby daughter getting cooked in the desert heat and sun and ending up looking like the imported Italian leather handbags that the Scottsdale women carry and which ironically enough matches their skin color and texture.

[4runnerchevy]

Its expensive anywhere in the Bay Area, and the better the neighborhood/schools the more exspensive it is. Good news is, that house prices will go up some day, so buying now might be beneficial.

[4x4mike]

I have some friends that live in Vacaville. Husband works in Bencia area at the Valero refinery and the wife works in Sacramento. They both have some sort of commute thing they do and it cuts down on costs. They have a 1 year old son so he's in daycare a couple days a week. Vacaville seems nice. Before that they lived in Farfield.

[reggie 00]

Vacaville

My parents are closing hopefully soon on a house over by the newer high school. The got a newly remodeled ( the owner bought it and remodeled it to flip it) ranch style house for 219K.

I work mostly out of Oakland about 1 mile from the airport. Average morning/afternoon commute time 1:15. Leave around 7am,4-5pm.

I was born out at Travis moved around a lot and end up back here in 89, did the Navy thing and was back in 2000. Don't really have any intention of ever moving away.

1.5 hrs from most Bay area things, 2 hrs from most Tahoe/Reno things.

Pop's retired himself from out at Travis. Worked Civil Service on 141's and C5's.
Been to places worse to be stationed.

Gets hot in the summer, worst in Aug. cools back down in Sept early Oct for the most part. Air con from Jun-Sep hardly use the heater.

There are some bad parts in Vacaville and the surrounding areas. Nothing to bad.
School system is pretty good. The Dude is in 1st grade and doing really well.

Come on down I'll find someplace for you to crash, Pop's, Bro's 5th Wheel, My Couch.

Its all good here.

Would much rather have the freedoms of Az but i figure you have to give and take somethings, and push for the rest till you get it.

[2ndGen]

this happpened in Tucson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_rz2wBYin4

[calrockx]

on bay area housing: http://sfist.com/2009/04/17/sf_home_...verall_bay.php

[Obi..]

If you move to the S.F. Bay Area have a place with a garage and lock it down or face the theft and smash and grab drama..there's places around Vacaville I wouldn't leave my truck parked.

Do like Reg's suggesting, be on the outskirts, the cost of living alone sucks, combine it with the market and the holding of of the influx of biotech funding to help with a second boom and you have a good reason if choosing things here to try to buy into property and plan on staying to get your R.O.I. There's places a little NW of the base where I lived for a while as a kid that are decent. Definitely consider Martinez and Antioch, both have grown and have some really nice places!

[Obi..]

**Bit of a haul, but there's some nice Victorians in Alameda coming up on the market also. IIRC the one we looked at was $363k but like the homes in S.F. it'd appreciate in value as Oakland is going through it's resurgence and renovations (Jack London Square even has some sick waterfront condos!)

Rumor is, as far as bases, that more of Alameda's going to be redone as are parts of the area around Travis, IE: (Reg, which streets was it that had the fires last summer?)

[Small_words]

Well, it's been over a year and a half since we first started trying to move and we finally did...to Phoenix. So, we're here in the heat of August and I like it a lot. It's pretty toasty but we've been swimming every day and it makes it just fine. Thank you everyone for the advice along the way. It was pretty stressful but we're finally at a hopefully permanent place.