Relocating from Southern California?

The Sacramento Valley is a great place to relocate to. Its central location, affordability, fantastic school systems, and recreational opportunities make it a perfect place to escape the congested roadways and large populations of Southern California.

Affordability

A notable difference between the Sacramento Valley and Southern California is the contrast between affordability and cost of living. In Sacramento County, 45% of people can afford the median priced home versus Los Angeles County (30%) which is just below California as a whole (31%). Some of the other counties in Southern California see an affordability index even below Los Angeles, like Orange at 22% and Ventura (29%) while Sacramento's neighbor, Placer, enjoys a 46% affordability rate.


See the full graph below as presented by C.A.R.

Housing Affordability Index
SOURCE: CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS®

A Less Crowded Option

One of the advantages that the Sacramento Area has over Southern California is the population differences. Los Angeles County alone has nearly 675% the population of Sacramento County and the population density is almost 70% more than the latter. Furthermore, Orange County is comparable in size to Sacramento County and has twice the population of Sacramento County. While its population may not seem as large as one would expect, San Francisco is both a city and county, (the entire county is just the city of SF) so its population of 800,000+ is all located within 47 square miles making it by far the most densely populated county.


Of the major cities in California, Sacramento (490,712) is the 6th largest by population. Los Angeles (3,971883) sits at the top of the list with San Diego (1,394,948), San Jose (1,026,908), San Francisco (864,816) and coming in just above Fresno (520,052) rounds out the top 5.


The list below shows the top 30 counties by population. The top 5 counties are all in Southern California, followed by 2 counties from the Bay Area, and finally Sacramento County. Placer County is #22 and El Dorado is #29.

COUNTY POPULATION SQUARE MILES POPULATION DENSITY
Los Angeles County 10,170,292 4,060 Sq. Miles 2,505.0
San Diego County 3,299,521 4,204 Sq. Miles 784.9
Orange County 3,169,776 790 Sq. Miles 4,012.4
Riverside County 2,31,026 7,208 Sq. Miles 327.6
San Bernardino County 2,183,133 20,062 Sq. Miles 106.1
Santa Clara County 1,918,044 1,291 Sq. Miles 1,485.7
Alameda County 1,638,215 738 Sq. Miles 2,219.8
Sacramento County 1,501,5335 966 Sq. Miles 1,554.2
Contra Costa County 1,126,745 720 Sq. Miles 1,54.9
Fresno County 974,861 5,963 Sq. Miles 163.5
San Francisco City/County 864,116 47 Sq. Miles 18,400.3
Ventura County 850,536 1,846 Sq. Miles 460.7
San Mateo County 765,135 449 Sq. Miles 1,704.1
San Joaquin County 726,106 1,399 Sq. Miles 519.0
Stanislaus County 538,388 1,495 Sq. Miles 360.1
Sonoma County 502,146 1,576 Sq. Miles 318.6
Tulare County 459,863 4,824 Sq. Miles 95.3
Santa Barbara County 444,769 2,738 Sq. Miles 162.4
Solano County 436,092 828 Sq. Miles 526.7
Monterey County 433,898 3,322 Sq. Miles 130.6
Placer County 375,391 1,503 Sq. Miles 249.8
San Luis Obispo County 281,401 3,304 Sq. Miles 85.2
Santa Cruz County 274,146 446 Sq. Miles 614.7
Merced County 268,455 1,929 Sq. Miles 139.7
Marin County 261,221 520 Sq. Miles 502.3
Butte County 225,411 1,640 Sq. Miles 137.4
Yolo County 213,016 1.012 Sq. Miles 210.5
El Dorado County 184,452 1,712 Sq. Miles 107.7
Imperial County 180,191 4,175 Sq. Miles 43.2

TL;DR

To make a long story short, the Sacramento Area is a great place to get the big city feel but without the big city populations.

Traffic Jams

Traffic is the price residents pay for living in big cities. A quick Google search of worst cities for traffic will heed dozens of list all with Los Angeles in the top 3. Business Insider published their list in March 2016 of the 5 cities that have the worst traffic in America.  Number 1 on the list is Los Angeles, estimating that commuters need to allow 43 extra minutes for traffic and waste an average of 6.8 days per year due to congested roadways! The article is based off TomTom Traffic Index which tracks and ranks world traffic in 174 major cities. It lists Los Angeles as the 10th worst traffic city in the world. Now Sacramento is not without its fair share of traffic and since it has seen a lot of growth in the last decade or so, Sacramento's traffic has increased substantially. However, it is only 25th on the list of worth US cities for traffic and 121st on the world list. So while Sacramento doesn't have barren roads, it is still less congested than both Los Angeles and the Bay Area.

A survey conducted by the California Association of Realtors (C.A.R.) found that most people would choose the super power: make traffic disappear.

SOURCE: CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS®

Want to find out more about the Sacramento Valley?

Visit our community profiles below to find out why we don't just sell the Sacramento Valley, we love the Sacramento Valley.
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