Real estate seems to really be picking up

I understand that the local real estate market is really picking up steam. One of my hotel amigos is saying that just about all his gringo guests are here to buy property and most of my guests are looking to move here as well (although looking to rent). I also understand the vacancies in the more popular areas are dropping and the rents are rising. Being a Canadian with the crappy dollar it makes me glad I bought back in 2012 when the RE was at rock bottom and the CDN was 1.02 USD.

What is everyone else hearing/seeing?

3 on my block alone sold very quickly. I was totally surprised at how fast. One was gone in a week.

Gee, I wonder why people are flocking here???? Do you Think it has been since Jan. 20, 2017?
Mexicans are also buying at the lake.

I think that date has something to do with it however I also understand there are a lot of Canadians still coming here and buying. That 35% hit on the canuck buck doesn't seem to be stopping them.

More info available on YouTube? Once the new neighbors move in we'll know for sure how they heard about the area. Housing is outrageously high in the states. If you surf YouTube, there's a large group of homeless retirees teaching other homeless or about to be homeless how to live in their car! Here you can own or rent and still live comfortable on 1/2-1/3 of cost of living NOB. People are figuring it out via internet.

What a total bummer: the idea of spending your "golden years" living in your car. I know that people who can manage to move here can actually live quite comfortably on their SS checks. The problem for many is that their income wouldn't qualify them for permanent residency.
I'm always gobsmacked when reading how much money people "should" have saved in order to have a decent retirement, when the facts show that most have saved very little. It's also hard to save if you can barely make ends meet.
On the other hand, I knew too many people back in CA who thought the good times would roll forever; spent everything they made and maxed their credit cards as well as buying more house than they could afford. They thought real estate inflation would save them.

I travel with people from Ca. Horrible expensive. some are moving to other places, rent, taxes, insurance, too high.

I watched a YouTube channel last night of some people walking through what was valued in 2008 or 2009 as an 8 million dollar mansion, now abandoned worth 1 million.  The owner committed real estate loan fraud.   They showed pictures of the place in its glory days. Greed got the best of the owner.

Gringal you're absolutely correct, rather than planning ahead, some people are careless, blow it all and lose it all.  I'm still kind of shocked at how some of the wealthier families that I knew growing up decided to retire.  From the grandest house to a duplex to a remodeled mobile home in a retirement park.  I'm not knocking rv'ing, a smaller place or frugal living, it's life and as we get older we don't want all the responsibility or cost of the grand house. You can kind of tell the difference from frugal living to not planning well.  When I went up north for my Mom's celebration of life service, i was surprised when a certain couple that i grew up with being very interested in our area down here because costs are so high in northern Cal.  But it's not just cost, crime is ridiculous and they aren't secured up there like we are down here.  We're ahead of the game while up there frogs in a pot of soon boiling water.

In our NOB city, there are a few streets in a more industrial section of town that has cars parked semi permanently on each side of the street. In the morning, you'll see camp chairs set up, people cooking on camp stoves. Dogs tied to bumpers. Once every few months, police move them, they just find another less used street and start again. Same for abandoned mall parking lots, they become campsites.
Not uncommon to see cars completely packed with personal belongings and just a spot carved out for the driver to sit/drive/sleep. When you consider: https://www.forbes.com/sites/maggiemcgrath/2016/01/06/63-of-americans-dont-have-enough-savings-to-cover-a-500-emergency/#4294135b4e0d

Some people thought I was crazy to work until I qualified for maximum SS but I figured that extra money might come in mighty handy 10 years down the road paying a utility bill. I came into a chunk of $$$ and my attorney tried like a Dutch uncle to get me to invest it instead of paying off my mortgage. This was just before the big financial mess when people lost 1/3 or more of their investments. A couple years later I sold my place for full ask and moved here.

Some folks have had really bad luck with catastrophic illnesses with their children, etc. but a lot of people overextended when they were throwing mortgages at people who never should have gotten them and then lost everything and has been said, some have lived WAY over their heads on credit cards. I wasn't the thriftiest in my family but some of the financial lessons from my Depression era father did rub off on me.