First of all, you need to get familiar with the CA DRE site below.

www.dre.ca.gov.

I took my license class long ago at a junior college.  It is very time consuming, but you get to talk to the live instructor.

Self study is inexpensive and convenient, but the main problem is that you have nobody to ask questions to.

My wife bought the course from Clare Institute.  The cost is reasonable, but when my wife called the owner to ask a question, she was mean and refused to answer the question. She said that she does not answer questions if you bought a self-study course.

It is somewhat frustrating, if you don’t have a real estate professional to ask questions.  However, just passing the course is not as hard as preparing for the state license exam.

After she passed the course, my wife ordered an on-line test preparation course from lumbleau.com,  she passed the state exam, and she was very satisfied with the test preparation course.

I personally don't know about their RE Principles course, but I think their prep course is superior.

Feel free to e-mail me for more questions.

Edward (First Rate Funding,  loan officer/consultant)
Edward@BestRateKim.com