California s Wonder Valley is arid and sparsely populated, where property values have jumped close to 20% in the last year, according to an estimate by Zillow . The typical home price is now close to $180,000.
Listen 11 min MORE Craig Higgins (right) spending time with the Madisons, his new neighbors, in Wonder Valley, California. Photo by Benjamin Gottlieb.
Craig Higgins has lived and worked in big cities all over the world: New York, Seattle, London, Paris. But he most recently bought his dream home in the middle of Southern California’s high desert.
“Every property I looked at sold within two days above asking price, so I knew something was going on here,” Higgings said.
“Here” is Wonder Valley about a two and a half hour drive from Los Angeles. Population? About 700.
Eventually, Higgins said, he got lucky and bought a small house directly from its owner in an all-cash deal of just under $50,000. That’s a far cry from LA County’s sizzling real estate market, where the median home price is more than $700,000, according to the financial services company CoreLogic.