[bigbadfeline]

Good point. Similar to how the share price of a company is meaningless, total capitalization is the only useful metric. Similarly, investors have gone to great expenses to commit their money into 19% of California's housing, greater expenses than any other state, even when considered on per-capita basis.

To understand the meaning of this, consider that supply/demand curves are naturally non-linear and even 5% increase in demand can double the prices.