I live in San Diego California. Arguably, one of the nicest places on Earth.

We have more days in the 70s than any place else in the US. We have Major League Baseball played in a beautiful park downtown. We even have an NFL team. And of course there is Sea World right in the middle of the greatest city park there is: Mission Bay Park. Don't forget the World Famous San Diego Zoo. The San Diego Bay (the Big Bay) is absolutely fantastic.

So why in the world would I want to go to Hemet?

Did I mention that we also have over-priced real estate? A lot of it in fact.

I'm a real estate broker. I make my living "doing" real estate. In an effort to better "do" real estate I joined ActiveRain (AR) earlier this month (July).

It has been a great experience. I've been able to sound off on several subjects that I am passionate about: Short Sales, Land, and Business.

When it comes to short sales AR's own expert is John Occhi of Hemet. So you see, I'm getting around to the question of why I went to Hemet.

John and I have gone ‘round and ‘round on the subject of short sales. I invite you to read his posts if you haven't already. You'll find my comments on all of them since I joined AR.

So why did I go to Hemet? Well, John convinced me that there are tremendous real estate "values" in Hemet California. I responded "there should be!" After all it is Hemet.

So I told him I would come up there and check it out. We set a date. The fateful day came.

I "parked" my wife at her sister's house in Temecula and headed on up there.

Hemet is a semi-arid agricultural community. The agriculture is mostly groves, but there are cows (lots of cows) and horses, and nursery growers.

I asked John what all the people did. There ARE people in Hemet. "Mostly commute" was his reply. Cheaper to live here than Orange County or San Diego County or even Riverside or Temecula for that matter.

"OK John, what are YOU doing here?" Well it seems that before John married he lived in the San Bernardino Mountains and Sherri (his wife) lived in San Diego. They met half-way. Isn't that sweet?

I met John at his office. He was easy to recognize. There were only two people in the office and he looked exactly like his picture.

I'm interested in building equity through "use" change. John had picked out several properties which he felt were good candidates. We went and looked at them. Mostly it is a hard slog to make money improving property in Hemet because there is so much new construction that the builders haven't been able to sell.

Houses sell for $200 per square foot or less (including the lot of course) so making a 4-bedroom house out of a 2-bedroom house is marginally profitable at best.

I did discover that there is a dearth of condos in Hemet. Actually, John told me.

We found a couple of parcels that might be good candidates for building new apartments or condos.

I will present these opportunities to some of my investors this week. Maybe my trip to Hemet will pay off.

No matter what, I feel richer for having met John Occhi