I think the house prices were higher. I sold a house in Mountain View (Monta Loma neighborhood) in Jan 1995 for $255k. And that was a bit of a distressed sale as I was the executor for an estate.
What is crazy about those prices is even though they are high, they weren't higher than any other wealthy area of a metropolitan region at that time. Neighborhoods in the greater Cleveland area were getting those prices back then too (e.g. shaker heights, cleveland heights, hudson, plenty more). The only thing is, those same neighborhoods in Cleveland only went up maybe another $200k or so since, and median prices in SF went up by what $1 million or more? Things really flew off the rails for the housing market in certain places just in the last few decades too.
Of course they were, the idea everyone used to be able to buy a house on a minimum wage salary is an internet fantasy. My parents bought a fixer upper in a crappy neighborhood for $90,000 in 1996.