I love L.A....but not enough to stay

OK, I love L.A. I love the Lakers, In-n-Out Burger, Tommy's and Fatburger, PCH, Mario's fabulous Mexican pizzas, the stupidly-renamed Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, Disneyland, UCLA, playing volleyball in Manhattan Beach after coming home from work, and the incomparable weather. I love the car culture (even with the insane traffic that it generates), my friends and family and so many other things about the damn place that I thought I'd never bail.

Then I moved to the Bay Area. However, my natural prejudice against No Cal meant that as wonderful a place as it was, I could never really love it the way I do So Cal. Still, it was California, and no way would I leave California. I wanted to stay so bad that I even thought about living in Sacramento.

But eventually I got married, relocated to Chicago and started a family. And now I couldn't think of raising a family anywhere else. Great town, great people, but they all seem to be asking, "Why did you leave?" Well, multiple reasons for departure, but this is the biggie:

stupidity

House prices in California are not just high, they are stupid high. The condo two doors down from the condo I grew up in Seagate just listed for $899,000-maybe 1800 square feet and not even on the deep water. 3-bedroom suburban bland homes for $750,000? I'm pretty sure not everybody I know makes $150,000 per year, so God help them when interest rates rise or that short interest-rate lock expires.

Here in Chicago, $899,000 buys you a mansion. $400,000 buys you a nice house with a good-size yard, easy access to the Metra to take you downtown. My friends back home are certain that I'm quite the fool having left California-but there's no way that I would willingly deal with a two-hour commute, never own a home in a desirable area, and never see my family except on weekends. Adios, cabrones.