Many of the cities with the longest road to recovery are California cities, where home prices rocketed out of control, and entire economies were supported largely by a real estate bubble. Fresno, Modesto, Salinas, Bakersfield, Stockton and Los Angeles all saw home prices soar to unsustainable levels and then begin their inevitable plunge.
–”The Best And Worst Cities For Recession Recovery” by Joshua Zumbrun

According to Forbes, a median priced home in the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana metropolitan area costs over five times the median income of this southern California area.

Here are some other economic stats from Forbes on the area that they call Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana:

• GDP at start of recession: $597 billion
• Projected GDP at the end of 2010: $581 billion (-2.6%, projected)
• Unemployment: 10.1%
• Median home/median salary ratio: 5.3

Forbes also states that although the southern California area was hit hard by the real estate bust, the area still “has a robust underlying economy” and the economy is growing. However, the area “still has some of the most expensive real estate in the country, indicating a housing recovery could be years away.”

Meanwhile, home buildeing company Standard Pacific is gung ho on housing in Orange County:

This [Orange County] is our best-performing area in the world.
–Ken Campbell, Standard president and CEO