Questions.(Schools, Price,Suburbs, Crime,Safety) (Simi Valley, West Covina: real estate, house, neighborhoods)

[deadant2]

Ok my family is considering a move to SoCal but i have a few Questions,

(A) How do people with Average(~68k) Incomes live? With real estate in the city so darn expensive. Can you tell me about the suburbs of LA and about the commute to Larger LA.

(B) Dangers, Hows the gang violence and Earthquakes, is it just OHIO paranoia?

(C) What would be your suggestions as far as Schools and Junior Colleges go. Are they all good or is there something i should be going for or Avoiding?

Thanks.

[Charles]

Where is your job(s)?
Rent or buy? What is your housing budget?
Kids? Ages?

Why do you Capitalize only certain Words?

[JohnG72]

That amount of money, even for a family of four, would have purchased a house in a halfway decent ethnic enclave of LA in the mid to late 90's provided the family did not have the unrealistic life expectations that people have developed over the past ten years.

I expect that may not ever be the case again. Even if the housing market dumps further(which it almost assuredly will), I think a family of four will need $80K plus a year to live in a reasonably safe LA suburb that has good schools.

The reason is twofold.

#1 LA unified was already not great in the late 90's. But some schools were ok still. Not anymore. Mostly only magnet schools and Woodland Hills schools are good. Contrast this with the mid 90's where the majority of SFV schools were still ok. As LA unified covers such a huge area, this is a LOT of the neighborhoods where its commuter friendly to LA.

#2 Many of the communities that are still relatively nice are now 80-90%% latino communities. Still nice areas like Whittier and West Covina, but the schools suffer when 1st generation families live there due to language and educational barriers.

There are still areas which will fall in price enough that a family of four on an $80K annual budget can afford a small house(remember, realistic expectations) and have decent schools. Simi Valley seems to be the number one area where this will happpen as I expect homes in the older areas that were built in the early 80's to drop into the high 100's in the next 4 years....but its a commute and you're likely looking at a 1300 sq ft 2 or 3 bd 1or 2ba home. It may or may not happen in older parts of South OC(such as Lake Forrest...would require a 50% drop from current bubble prices). What it means is you do any repair work yourself. You dump the Expedition in favor of a Corolla, you get rid of the superfluous crap that invades the life of most people I know, your once weekly family going out dinner is sometimes KFC, sometimes Dennys, and once a month Outback, El Torito, or Olive Garden.

Anyway, I'm only 38 and thats basically how I grew up in LA. Even with my dad having a good job(aerospace engineer).