The housing market in the States is ridiculous. There's the one extreme of Manhattan, then there's the house the parents of one of my best friends from Japan semi-recently bought in Lynden, Wash. that used to belong to a head exec. with Boeing. Huge house, huge separate stable with horses and llamas (came with the house, funny enough), and about at least 20 acres of rolling fields basically at the foot of Mount Baker. I can't remember if it cost them $500 000, or $750 000, but I assure you I haven't forgotten a zero in there, which is ridiculous, because the the cost and installation of the sound systems and other electronic controls wired into that place must have cost a decent percentage of that. I looked up some of the speakers that you can actually see in the walls/ceiling, and there were 8 in this one room that go (or used to go) for something like $5-10 000 a piece...
Also, you'd be surprised/disgusted at how little you can pay to get a 2 storey, 4 bedroom, 2 bath, plus garage throughout the southern half of the States - even in warm, gated, beach areas like, say, West Palm Beach. My brother and I found countless places in the $60-80 000 range that almost tempted us!