Cameron and Karie Herber have two incomes, good credit and successful careers. But the Riverside couple still can’t find a house they can afford to buy.

So they plan to buy some land and build their own home — in Idaho.

“These (Southern California) properties are out of our range. … There’s nothing we can afford,” said Karie Herber, 44, a nurse and mother of two with a dog named Vader. “We’ve now come to terms that we might have to move to Idaho.”

“We made a conscious decision we’re not going to be house poor to own a house,” added her husband, 45, a driller for an environmental firm. “It’s not affordable to own a home anymore.”

Corbin Herber checks out what’s in the fridge while Vader chills on the kitchen floor at the Herber family’s rental house in Riverside on Tuesday, May 21, 2019. Despite having two incomes, the Herbers can’t afford to buy a home, so the family is planning to move in with relatives to save money and eventually move to Idaho. (Photo by Jennifer Cappuccio Maher, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG)

Corbin, left, Karie, Connor and Cameron Herber with their dog, Vader, on the front porch of their rental house in Riverside on Tuesday, May 21, 2019. Despite having two incomes, the Herbers can’t afford to buy a home, so the family is planning to move in with relatives to save money and eventually move to Idaho. (Photo by Jennifer Cappuccio Maher, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG)

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Natalie Oshin, 29, is a licensed attorney, but she still can’t find a condo she likes in Orange County because they’re out of her price range, too small, too old and still too expensive. New units are sold out before they’re built. She plans to continue renting until she has a partner or a fiance who can share the cost of buying a home. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)



Connor Herber takes Vader out to play in the grass in the front yard of his family’s rental house in Riverside on Tuesday, May 21, 2019. Despite having two incomes, the Herbers can’t afford to buy a home, so the family is planning to move in with relatives to save money and eventually move to Idaho. (Photo by Jennifer Cappuccio Maher, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG)

Corbin, left, Connor and their parents, Cameron and Karie Herber, with their dog, Vader, at their rental house in Riverside on Tuesday, May 21, 2019. Despite having two incomes, the Herbers can’t afford to buy a home, so the family is planning to move in with relatives to save money and eventually move to Idaho. (Photo by Jennifer Cappuccio Maher, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG)

Corbin Herber and his mom, Karie, share a laugh while making dinner at their rental house in Riverside on Tuesday, May 21, 2019. Despite having two incomes, the Herbers can’t afford to buy a home, so the family is planning to move in with relatives to save money and eventually move to Idaho. (Photo by Jennifer Cappuccio Maher, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG)



Natalie Oshin, 29, is a licensed attorney, but she still can’t find a condo she likes in Orange County because they’re out of her price range, too small, too old and still too expensive. New units are sold out before they’re built. She plans to continue renting until she has a partner or a fiance who can share the cost of buying a home. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)

The Herbers are among thousands of would-be Southern California homebuyers who are being priced out of the market due to a limited number of homes for sale and relentlessly rising home prices.

In the seven years since the housing crash ended, home values in more than three-quarters of U.S. metro areas have climbed faster than incomes, data compiled by The Associated Press shows. The news service paired the Case-Shiller Home Price Index from more than 425 U.S. metro areas with wage index data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The numbers show:

Home prices increased four times faster than wages in Los Angeles and Orange counties from the summer of 2011 through the summer of 2018.

While incomes rose 17% in L.A. County, house prices rose 73%.

Incomes rose 15% in Orange County, compared with a 58% jump in house prices.

Inland Empire wages increased 14% in the seven-year period, while prices jumped 80% — a six-fold jump over wages.

over wages. By comparison, U.S. wages increased 15%, while prices rose 45%.

Historically low mortgage rates cushioned the blow from rapidly escalating home prices somewhat. Nonetheless, the typical mortgage payment still jumped 73% in L.A. and Orange counties over the past seven years, while incomes increased no more than 17%. In the Inland Empire, mortgage payments rose 85% vs. a 14% rise in pay.

Renters rising

For millennials looking to buy their first home, the hunt feels like a race against the clock, putting extreme pressure on 20- and 30-somethings as they try to balance mortgage payments, student loans, child care and their careers, the AP reported.

A Redfin analysis found these buyers are leaving too-hot-to-touch markets like the Bay Area, Seattle, Boston and Southern California and buying in more reasonably priced neighborhoods near cities like Salt Lake City, Oklahoma City and Raleigh, N.C. That, in turn, is driving up home prices in those communities.

Those who stay in Southern California, meanwhile, are forced to keep renting.

U.S. Census figures show that while Southern California homeownership rates increased 2% from 2011 through 2017, the number of renter households increased three times faster, jumping 6%.

That’s making income inequality even worse since homeownership is a key way to build wealth, said Ralph McLaughlin, deputy chief economist for real estate data firm CoreLogic.

“Fundamentally, what this all means is younger generations are losing out on the benefits of the American dream,” McLaughlin said. “If a generation is getting started later in life at homeownership, then there is less wealth-generating power in their lifetime.”

Giving up

Natalie Oshin is a newly minted attorney working as a contract specialist for an Irvine real estate firm. But rising rents and student loans curbed her ability to save for a home.

After spending six to eight months hunting for a townhome or a condo with her father, Oshin, 29, abandoned her search. The only places she could afford were older condos. And she would need a roommate to cover the house payments.

“I gave up on buying a home,” Oshin said. “I just think the options are really hard to live in. They’re really old. … The prices are way too high. The square footage of the places where I looked, they’re really small. I think that wages are just not keeping up with the cost of living in this area.”

Oshin said she’s going to wait until she has a partner or a fiancé before she starts home shopping again.

“I need a second income,” she said.

Millennials like Oshin aren’t the only ones struggling to buy their very first home.

Orange resident Daniel Zogaib, 57, makes a six-figure salary as an engineer but still can’t find a house he can afford. Like Oshin, Zogaib needs a second income to have enough to get a home in Orange or Los Angeles counties.

Zogaib could afford houses back when he first started thinking about buying in 2009. But he didn’t have enough for a down payment then. By the time he had saved enough money, prices had exceeded his $600,000 price range.

The median house price is $630,000 in L.A. County and $770,000 in Orange County, according to CoreLogic.

Zogaib isn’t willing to buy a condo. And he’s not willing to commute from the Inland Empire to his job in Cypress.

“I hope everything crashes again so I can buy a home in Orange County,” Zogaib said. “I remember when you didn’t need to have a college degree to buy a house. Now you need two college degrees.”

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The short straw

To see where renters have the greatest chance of affording a home, researchers for real estate services firm First American Financial Corp. determined “house-buying power” for renters in 44 markets. They then compared that power to home prices in each area.

The result: The typical Los Angeles-Orange County renter can only afford 4 percent of the homes for sale here — the lowest number among all 44 metro areas.

The Inland Empire ranked 10th out of 44 markets, with median-income renters only able to afford 28% of homes for sale.

“We argued the 50th-percentile renter, the median renter, should be able to afford half of the homes in their markets,” said Odeta Kushi, First American’s deputy chief economist. “Unfortunately, we found that is not the case in the Los Angeles and Riverside markets.”

Wealthier renters don’t get much of a break. For example, L.A.-Orange County renters with incomes at the 80th percentile can only afford 41% of local homes for sale.

By comparison, the 80th percentile renter in the Inland Empire can afford 76% of homes there.

“That’s a little closer to what we would like to see,” Kushi said.

Those who are stuck renting are caught in a vise since rents also are rising faster than incomes due to rising employment — the four-county area added 1.2 million jobs since the end of the housing crash — and sluggish homebuilding.

“Everyone’s drawing the short straw here,” McLaughlin said. “The only ones who are benefiting are homeowners. They are getting equity.”

Pulling up stakes

Riverside County resident L.C. Hayes earns about $80,000 a year as a social worker but found herself rapidly priced out after she started house hunting in 2016.

She qualified to buy a home for $295,000 at a time when half of all Riverside County houses were selling below $310,000 and plenty still were listed below $200,000. By the summer of that year, Riverside County’s median house price jumped $25,000. Within a year, the median was up $40,000. The median today is $390,000, or $95,000 more than Hayes can afford.

“While I was in the process of doing the papers and trying to qualify, … the prices just spiked and went out of reach,” said Hayes, 43. “I just said, ‘To hell with it.’ ”

With two children and two dogs, Hayes doesn’t want to buy a condo. And rising rent not only put rental houses out of reach, but she’s also struggling to afford her current three-bedroom apartment. Meanwhile, not having a yard for her pets, more space for her kids and her own garden to work in are taking a toll on her.

“What’s sad about it is the lack of permanency,” Hayes said. “People want to stay in their communities, but they can’t stay.”

Many frustrated buyers are giving serious thought to pulling up stakes and leaving California.

Oshin, the 29-year-old attorney, said her best friend from high school is leaving with her boyfriend because they can’t afford to buy even with two incomes. Other friends are moving out of state, too.

“At some point, I wonder, am I stupid for staying here? Should I go somewhere else?” Oshin said. “But I want to stay here. My family is here. My work is here. I’m licensed here. That’s a big factor.”

Hitting the jackpot

The Herbers once hit the jackpot in the Southern California housing market.

The Riverside couple paid $222,000 in 2004 for a three-bedroom, one-story house on the street where Karie Herber grew up. She was 29 at the time, and Cameron was 30. The price doubled within 18 months. When Cameron’s job moved to Texas, they used their profits to buy a house in Beaumont, Texas, then eventually moved back to California, where they bought a two-story, four-bedroom house for $603,500.

Then came a streak of bad luck. Karie was injured and lost her job. The bills started piling up just as the bottom fell out of the housing market. By 2010, the Herbers were in Chapter 11 bankruptcy and foreclosure. They lost their two-story house after its value fell to $300,000.

Seven years later, their credit restored, they started house shopping again. By then, Riverside house prices were unaffordable.

They looked in Ontario, Rancho Cucamonga and Hesperia — locations farther and farther from Cameron’s job in Fullerton.

Finally, the couple decided to move in with Cameron’s parents with their two sons, ages 17 and 20, to save for land near Boise, where they hope to build a home of their own. They estimate it will take at least two years before they have enough saved up to move.

“There’s a shortage of houses (here),” Cameron said. If you put in a bid, added his wife, “you get in a bidding war.”

Trade-offs

Not everyone is failing to find a home to buy. But often there are trade-offs for doing so.

After spending a year working two jobs seven days a week, Teresa Mitchell made an offer on a one-bedroom Santa Ana condo in a complex with a pool, a gym and tennis and volleyball courts.

On Wednesday, the seller accepted her $240,000 offer — an offer she could afford thanks to $99,100 she’s getting in grants and deferred-payment loans through low-income homebuyer programs. She will go from paying $640 a month for a room in a house with nine other people to a house payment of $1,218 a month, including her homeowner’s association dues. A typical studio apartment, by comparison, rents for $1,200 to $1,500 a month, she said.

“Escrow started today,” Mitchell, 53, a support coordinator for disabled adults, said Wednesday afternoon. “It’s still surreal to me.”

The trade-off?

It’s just 500 square feet, without a dining room. While that’s a non-starter for a lot of home shoppers, it’s not much of a trade-off for Mitchell, who spent $640 a month for the past five years renting a room in a house with a microwave and a small refrigerator.

“I’d rather go smaller,” Mitchell said. “Being single, I don’t need a lot of space. … I’m giving up a dining room, but I work every day, and I don’t entertain.”

— Register staff writer Jonathan Lansner and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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