Man.. Here I am, living in CA for over 11 years now and barely got my life in order to be comfortable to start looking for houses. It's still crazy expensive! I used to live in San Jose and some of the houses there that are worth at least $1m aren't even pretty!
One of the VPs at the place I work asked me to model a warehouse for him. It is currently being built next to his house (also under construction) in Arizona! He's been over CA for a while and will probably move states soon.
Prices over there need to go down 50% and it will still be expensive!