I would post your question in the Buying and Selling a Home forum since this is about building a house. I feel for you but the truth is in a hot market, you're better off making an immediate offer and then if two days later you decide against it, backing out.

When you paddle up the Amazon, there's lots of crocodiles for which to be watchful...

Waves. A lot of tech money being used to buy vacation properties, here, driving up prices well beyond what local folks can afford. Zuck is building a compound on Kaua`i and it's rumored that Facebook bought an entire floor of one of the new luxury buildings.

I know what it's like. I have lived in SV for the past 20+ years. Better to live in the heart of a healthy economy than a decaying one, though.

Absolutely know how you feel! We live in Vancouver. Enough said. When we bought our tear down lot it was after several failed attempts at other lots both in Vancouver central and North Vancouver. All offers we put in were over asking, no conditions, and yet time and time we were outbit. Sometimes by hundreds of thousands of dollars. So yes it feels impossible and crazy. But then we found our dream lot and our bid, with our lovely family story about building a forever home, was the winner. It can and will happen for you.

Is anyone going to sell their house for "Amazon/Google/Facebook money" then go out and shop locally, purchase a new set of encyclopedias, frequent their local library, and buy more stationary and stamps?

Is anyone going to sell their house for "Amazon/Google/Facebook money" then go out and shop locally, purchase a new set of encyclopedias, frequent their local library, and buy more stationary and stamps?

I totally don't know if this is legal, lol, but when I go to sell my house, can I *at least* sell it to a person/family who lives in the USA, and not some random overseas gazillionaire? lol Or is that considered discrimination in housing?

Also, could I refuse to sell to Mr. Facebook, if I wanted to? Not that he'd want *my* humble home -- when he has half of Hawaii -- but still. I'm not a FB user, and look for ways to limit/eliminate support of it.

It is much more prevalent here in the Bay Area and my friends complain all the time. It's like the topic for every dinner party.

Why don't you buy a piece of land and start to build your own home?

Susha, I suspect Seattle area is similar to Vancouver, there are no random pieces of land out there waiting to be bought up. They are all filled with houses, some needing to be torn down, to create a space for a new build. In Vancouver unless you go far out to the suburbs there are no vacant lots.

Exactly, Alison. We've been looking for land to build on for years. In my area, which has finite geographical boundaries, an undeveloped lot is a rare commodity.

By the way, Alison, I lived in Vancouver (west of Denman) during grad school. Loved it. This was the mid-nineties, and I recall being shocked at the housing prices even back then!