San Jose is the 10th largest city in the United States and ranked as the third largest city in California. It is seated at the southern tail of the Bay Area, commonly known as the Silicon Valley, in Santa Clara County. The city, called the "Capital of Silicon Valley" was California's first capital during its statehood in the year 1850. Housing developments started to flourish between the 1960's to the early 90's. The city which is situated along the Bay Area gets an approximate of 300 sunny days and only 70 precipitation days usually during October to early May. However, being situated along the said area, it is composed of microclimate which means that the citizens in different areas experience extreme climates at the same time in a day. The city is divided into different neighborhoods which are comprised of people aged 34 and are mostly married with family or divorced.

It's not hard to find a good paying job in San Jose because of the fact that a lot of big companies have built their headquarters and major facilities here. To name a few, there's Adobe Systems, IBM, Hitachi, Lockheed Martin, BEA Systems, Hewlett-Packard, Cisco, SunPower and eBAy. The city is generally well off compared to other cities within the state, which might be the reason why the cost of living here is about 61.51% higher than the US standards. Sales tax is at 8.25 % while the income tax rate is 6%. The median home cost is $759,000 which is relatively higher than the $217,200 US average. This might be compensated by the higher rate of household income which is at $82,000 per annum compared to the $44,684 income per year of families in the whole of US. The overall cost of living is 162 for San Jose, covering utilities, food and miscellaneous expenses. Commute time for those going to work is 29 minutes and most of the people here travel using their own car. Crime rate is at 5, 10 being the highest.

Although San Jose doesn't have a team for the NFL, MBL and NBA, it's still lucky to have the San Jose Sharks playing in the National Hockey League or NHL. There are non-"big four" teams in the city like the San Jose Earthquakes and Real San Jose for soccer, San Jose Saber Cats and San Jose Giants for arena football and baseball respectively. Despite this, sports lovers could still find it worthy to consider a San Jose, CA home mortgage because in 2009 a new stadium will be opened, and will be the home of the San Francisco 49ers football team. The city might soon be opening a practice facility for the Oakland Raiders in the near future.

There are a lot of tourist attractions found in the city. Most famous are the Guadalupe River Trail, The Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum at the Rosicrucian Park, Kelley Park, Happy Hollow Park and Zoo, Cathedral Basilica of St. Joseph, etc. The San Jose Public Library and the San Jose State University Library were both hailed as the Library of the Year in 2004. Dining in the city? You can check out meals sumptuous meals and gourmet served at Original Joe's, La Victoria, Henry's Hi-Life, Amato's Restaurant, etc. You can also consider going to the bars or pubs like San Jose Bar and Grill, JJ Blues and Toon's Nightclub among others.

About the Author:

Will is a writer for Home Mortgage Pal, a free resource for people that are looking to obtain their first San Jose Home Mortgage or people that already have a mortgage. Home Mortgage Pal is updated frequently with new mortgage articles as well as industry news. Home Mortgage Pal also contains a comprehensive directory of US based mortgage lenders.