Buying the median home in Long Beach means financing $760,000. Against the area's $72,000 median household income, that works out to a 10.6x price-to-income ratio.
Long Beach's 0.75% property tax rate runs below the 1.1% national average. That's $475/month on the median home here, not a rounding error against the mortgage payment.
California levies a state income tax on top of the $4,712/month this mortgage runs. Model your real after-tax take-home before deciding how much payment you can carry.
Long Beach's cost of living index is 145, above the 100 national baseline. That's on top of the housing numbers above, not instead of them.
Long Beach's median home price runs 15% lower than nearby Los Angeles: $895,000 there versus $760,000 here.