I would move on.The only time this even remotely makes sense if you can buy the unit next to yours with the possibility of one day making a great combination, or you buy them in bulk and play the numbers game with a very long time horizon.

After poor returns on the 401K for over a decade and what appears to be trouble on the horizon I am concerned.

For my part, saving over a 3-5 year period before my next RE purchase, a time frame which I consider meets a minimum time horizon for a 'long-term' investment, I invest monthly cash flows with a dollar cost averaging mentality into a mix of stock market index funds, growth stock mutual funds, and ETFs.

In the core Bay Area (most of SJ, peninsula, east bay up to Berkeley etc) the market is exactly as @Bob Bowling describes over a 10 year horizon.

Really, I'm not saying there are no issues on the horizon, BUT good properties in well chosen locations WILL weather through.[ I'll let you have the last word Joel :) ]

If you are investing over a short time horizon, then those transaction costs may be material enough to sway things.But, if all else is equal, then you, along with many investors in similar situations, are probably going to find that SELLING (via a 1031 exchange most likely, but talk to your accountant, especially if you lived there the last few years) is the way to go.Why? 

However the time horizon with this strategy will take too long.  

If you are buying and holding, the long term value of the property becomes far more important - although some places if they produce cash flow can be fine not being a 'high value/equity' type of thing, if your time horizon is long enough...What's it zoned?

John Heffner it comes down to how well this investment will perform in the next few years (or whatever your investment horizon) vs other opportunities you might be evaluating.Personally, I am liquidating some SFR rentals which have appreciated over the past 4-5 yrs and were generating 2% but I can get better investments in larger apartment deals and it scales much better.

Article written in 2013 claiming a massive crash is on the horizon: http://investmentwatchblog.com/paul-b-farrell-the-...4.