The long winters were too much and they decided the foothills of the sierras is what he wants in terms of climate and topography.  

pricing dipped a little over the winter... wonder if they will go up.

I know little about California, but here in the midwest grass goes completely dormant and looks dead during the winter months, and again if we have very hot dry weather in the summer.

I ended up not moving forward on any because of concerns of age, pipes in winter, etc.

I am a newer investor looking to build systems Does anybody use a check list before winter It gets very cold and we have multiple snow storms to avoid surprises mid winter as much as possible

Judging but your position, if I were you, I would get a summer/winter job with a general contractor (or as a maintenance guy!)

I found it difficult to keep my footing on the walkways in the winter even having shoveled it myself after every snowfall. 

Plan on an HOA fee of about $500-800/month.Plan on vacation months (Apr-Aug) bringing in 3X what Winter months do in rent.   

This market in particular seems to have significant opportunity 3/4 seasons (winter, summer, fall).

This article https://www.inman.com/2022/10/... discusses the slowdown and I personally am seeing much less interest from when I opened my STR in September to the current demand, and I am not sure if (a) Airbnb/VRBO are playing with their algorithm trying to pump up new properties at the expense of properties that have been around for a bit, (b) the winter is simply slower than the fall (which would seem odd to me since we are in full blown holiday season), or (c) whether the article is spot on and STRs are too flooded.