A big reason why homes cost so much in California

From today's San Jose Mercury News: "Because of the city's strict voter-mandated residential growth control initiative, the group had to go through the city's competitive application process multiple times to secure approval to build their 100-unit project in two separate phases, said Tom Iamesi, the group's director of housing development.
The city program, enacted by voters in 1977 and updated in 1990, established a formula that limits growth to about 200 homes per year, with 20 percent of those new homes allotted to affordable housing annually, said Jim Rowe, Morgan Hill planning manager."

And a primary motive for the growth-control measures, of course, is the state's wacky property tax laws, which reward cities for businesses, but not the residents who live there.