If housing appreciation is the goal, Seattle's the place to be. But the truth is not everyone wants to live there. Certainly not Alonso Mora.

On a recent morning, Mora was busy preparing for the lunch rush at Mazatlan, the Auburn restaurant owned by his parents.

Mora grew up in Auburn. "Even though it's bigger than it used to be, everyone knows each other from school or work," he says, the thought bringing a smile to his face.

When he reflects on Seattle, he thinks of "big-city attractions . . . diverse restaurants, sporting events, concerts. It's all happening in Seattle. But that doesn't exactly mean you want to live there."

Mora, 23, shares the story of a couple of Auburn friends, who rented a two-bedroom apartment in North Seattle's Wallingford neighborhood. "The rent is almost as much as a mortgage payment down here. It's outrageous, and it's just rent. I can't believe it!"

He figures that if rent is that bad, buying a house in Seattle must be worse. But Auburn, that's another story. A buddy his age just bought his first home, and Mora is confident he can, too. "It's feasible within the next five, 10 years because there are plenty of older neighborhoods, and then there are always new developments."

Mora is right.

Houses in Auburn are much more affordable than houses in Seattle. The Seattle Times analysis of single-family-home sales data for King County shows that while house prices have taken off in most Seattle neighborhoods, communities in South King County have stayed in last place.

Annual appreciation rates in Seattle are in the 8 percent to 10 percent range; in South King County they are roughly 4 1/2 percent to 6 percent. This has helped keep homes affordable in a region that had lower prices to begin with.

Compare, for example, Auburn and Wallingford, two neighborhoods with working-class roots and houses about the same size: a median 1,400 square feet (median means half are larger, half are smaller). Both communities have vintage main streets that exude friendliness along with a sense of history.

Auburn had 5.21 percent annual appreciation over the past 15 years; Wallingford had 9.72 percent.

Here's what that difference would have meant to last year's homebuyers.

To purchase a median-priced home in Auburn, they would have paid $160,000, or $102 a square foot. They would have needed an income of $43,000 - presuming they got a 30-year mortgage at 8 percent interest with 20 percent down.

But to buy a median-priced home in Wallingford, they would have needed an income of $76,000. That's because the median home price in Wallingford was $286,000, or $209 a square foot. And that's a very moderate price for a North Seattle address.

Even more to the point, no South County community had houses as expensive as in Wallingford per square foot last year, and the most expensive - East Rural King County - was still $65 a square foot cheaper.

Thus it is no surprise that agencies such as HomeSight, which helps first-time and low-income buyers become homeowners, routinely advise them to shop in South King County.

A fixer for $120,000

Steven Yamashita, an agent with Century 21 New Horizons, recently helped a family new to America buy their first home. The husband works with truck air conditioners, the wife is a homemaker; together with their older children they live in an apartment. By shopping intensively they were able to find a small Auburn fixer for about $120,000.

While houses at that price are fast disappearing, Yamashita says it's still possible to find a modest newly built house for $170,000.

Why have South King County communities appreciated so little?

It's a combination of factors say real-estate experts:

First there's supply and demand. "The region has grown, and Seattle hasn't built any more homes," notes Dick Conway, a Seattle economist. "But on the perimeter, we can build homes, and we can keep up with demand."

Drive winding back roads from the Green River Valley to Federal Way, passing small farms and large tracts of woods, and you'll see signs enticing buyers to visit communities so new the paint is still fresh. They have names like Bellacarino Woods, Vistara, Jornada at West Beverly Hills. Miniature basketball hoops in the driveways are evidence of the young families buying there.

Wages - or what buyers can afford to pay - are lower. South County jobs lean heavily toward manufacturing and retail. This is, after all, home to a couple of Boeing facilities and the SuperMall of the Great Northwest.

Appraiser Alan Pope believes the earnings of South County workers are not increasing much past the inflation rate, and the people with higher wages aren't attracted to living in South County, at least in great numbers.

Or to put it another way, Pope says, "The question really is: How far does a software engineer want to live from work?"

Traffic is a frequent local complaint, particularly for those who live in South County and work in Seattle. On weekends, the drive up I-5 from Federal Way takes maybe 30 minutes. On weekdays, it gridlocks to an hour both mornings and evenings, and "pretty common is an hour and a half," says a woman who lives there. "That's the biggest drawback about down here if you work in Seattle."

Seattle and South County buyers want different things from their neighborhoods. Real-estate agents say Seattle's in-city buyers seek neighborhoods with character, where they can meet over coffee or browse in interesting little shops.

Some suburbs don't quite fill that bill. The Federal Way resident describes her city as "a hodgepodge of traffic and strip malls without any community gathering place. It doesn't have a downtown core where you can park your car and walk. It doesn't have interesting shops. You have your basic mall."

That may be quite all right with many buyers. Frank Nowak, office manager of Century 21 New Horizons in Auburn, says that while lower costs lure buyers to his area, the lasting appeal is the rural flavor.

"You get away from the major hub of the cities, and that creates the ability for buyers to have animals," Nowak says. "We also hear a lot about how people don't want to be right on top of their neighbors, so you end up with a little bit larger lots."

Different goals when moving up

Unlike Seattle owners, those in the South End who want to move up don't think in terms of moving to a better neighborhood, adds Mike Morelli, manager of John L. Scott's Kent office. "If you live in the South End and want to move up, that would be to lakefront, or view or acreage. There's no, `geez once I move to that neighborhood I'll have it made.'

"When I look at our upper-end properties here," Morelli continues, "I'm looking at something with acreage, but in Seattle, I'm looking at a house in a neighborhood like Magnolia on a city lot."

Any area rural enough to offer acreage is less likely to have high appreciation, Morelli thinks, because, in his experience, there's less competition for each property. "I think it's more the pressure of where the people are that make the most amount of money."

So what would it take for South King County to experience higher appreciation? "The high-tech industry building there, because appreciation has to do with employment," says Pope, the appraiser. "It would be an employment base that creates high-income jobs."

Until that day, the mantra for South King County communities could be: Who cares about appreciation? We have affordable housing.

Elizabeth Rhodes can be reached at erhodes@seattletimes.com.