Account ClosedIn answer to your question of why, its because California is not landlord friendly, and their asset protection laws are fairly weak as well.  

My concern is that wages have not grown with rents and the underlying economy may have weaknesses.

And it's a new muscle for you to exercise, so expect it to be weak at start.

Some communities only allow a certain percentage of the units to be non-owner occupied, some don't allow Air BnB, their balance sheet could be weak and impose a lot of assessments.Try and reach out to the board of the HOA and hopefully attend their meetings to get a feel for them as a governing body of your investment. 

Yes these areas have a low barrier of entry which makes the novice investor excited but be wanted the tenants in these areas are not the easiest to deal with and the rental environment is not for the weak hearted.

I do not relate well to weak minded, lazy, non-adaptive types as change is ever present and ever accelerating at each of us.Minimize the role of the government.  

Now that would not have helped the underlying viability .. but it sure would have let people communicate early on when weakness appeared in the model.. 

If you are weak of heart and think about it longer the bleeding continues.

I used to own a gym, and my personal trainers would always tell our clients to focus on what works for them, and create a custom plan based on their current state, limitations, strengths, weaknesses, goals, etc. 

If any link is weak - replace it as soon as possible.