My experience in Houston was that it was not hard to find break-even or better properties there. Prices there have not been appreciating much. There are still plenty of single family homes under 100K. Houston is expected to double in population within the next decade. Developers are building on the outskirts and the city is rapidly expanding. New home prices are from the $130K on up. High prices in the city for SFRs are in the millions so there is a wide range. I think Houston is a counter-cycle city, that will be appreciating when the bubble breaks in the current hot markets. The only negatives I can give you for Houston are that the apartment vacancy rates are around 8%, but that is probably down considerably since Katrina. With no city zoning they rely on homeowners associations to control property use; sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't. There are no limits on real estate tax increases so this can also be a factor.

We're having decent growth here in the Dallas Fort Worth metroplex. Particularly north of Fort Worth in the Alliance airport area (a lot of Ross Perot development here).

I deal with Cali investors who are looking for better deals, and we usually find them!