We were going to rent for a year or two before we buy our forever home in Shaker (yes, I know taxes are high but we love it there and all our friends are there, so a bitter sweet cost to swallow).

Forever?

Lower prices wouldn't hurt our market - it is expensive, 10% year over year increases for going on almost 5 years can't go forever.

Otherwise the tenants if they get upset for you for any reason either during or anytime after the remodel can report you to the city and get you fined for all kinds of things and you may be liable for any lead paint exposure effects to them forever.   

Personally, I can’t imagine the zoning can stay the way it is forever because the area severely lacks lodging and due to the number of vineyards and breweries, will only grow tourism.

I'm 29, so I hope that I have much better days ahead and reach my potential later in life - ideally, things go on improving forever...I think that as far as the energy thing goes, I don't think I'm old enough to have peaked on that front.

Like others mentioned already I think a buying window has opened, but it won't last forever. 

Some last more than others but as the largest socialist experiment, the USSR, taught us - it can't go on forever.

., using a market rent for the owner occupied unit even though you're planning to occupy it.That lets you do an "apples to apples" comparison of the property vs. other investment properties and evaluate it as an investment using the usual rules of thumb, measurements of risk & return, etc.It also acknowledges that you may not live there forever, so it gives you an idea of whether the property will be able to support itself someday when you move out.

CA from Puget Sound area and the market was horrid there at the time took for ever to sell and for less than they paid for it.