• US Home prices are surging 13 times faster than wages. Santa Cruz had one of the highest ratios nationwide of price appreciated to wage growth at 94%.

• In 2014 in California, the sale of vacation homes fell 1% from 6% to 5%.

• Nationwide, investor purchases fell about 7% last year, and purchases by owner-occupants declined 13% to 3.2 million.

• Zillow reports that there were 193 housing permits issued for every 1000 new residents in the Bay Area, a nationwide low. (In Chicago, there were 906 permits issued per 1000 new residents).

• Bay Area residents can expect to pay 44% of their income on rent or 39% of their income on their monthly mortgage payment.

• The Bay Area is TOP in the country for Home Value Index, $715,800 in Zillow's February calculations of the median of estimate of what homes are worth.

• San Francisco is still the most expensive city in the United States for rental units ($3400/mo median rental). Oakland is Number 4 in the country ($2000/mo median rent).

• Home prices nationwide are rising roughly twice as fast as wages.

• Home prices in California are up more than 45% since the experienced a low 2011.

• A significant numbers of underwater mortgages remain, holding down supply.

• California, along with several other states and cities, is near the top of Fitch Rating's Sustainable Home Price Model's Most Over-Valued City List.

A whole new field for financing is growing from California to Florida. HELOC, as a money source, is booming again. Its use has risen 36% in the last 12 months, according to the Consumer Bankers Association. Now there is an alternative. Rather than loading more debt onto your home with a credit line, how about sharing part of your future appreciation with private investors? You get a lump sum of cash up front and make no payments for years. You settle up with them when you sell or otherwise terminate the agreement. For example, your house is valued at $500k. You agree to share 45% of future appreciation on the property once qualified, in terms of your financial ability to handle property taxes and upkeep. The investor gives you $51,750k today. When you end the agreement, you'd have to give the investor its portion of the appreciation in the house plus its initial investment. So, if your house appreciated in 10 years by $120k and you needed to sell, you'd owe the investor $51,750, the original loan amount, plus its appreciation, $54k. Their cut after 10 years would be $105,750.  One company says it has or is in the process of making appreciation-sharing agreements on homes with an aggregate value of $200 million this year, and expects to hit $1 billion by the end of this year.