Distance from LA's rich areas to bad areas? (Pasadena, Vista: low income, 2014)

[Fastfreddy00]

I know LA is where most of the rich and famous live at. However, i know that is also where a lot of the people from the poor areas live at as well. Such as you hear about compton and south central and those other areas.


Im from NY so im not familiar with LA. But are the rich and poor areas a good distance apart from each other? Such as if you go to beverly hills or around those areas, would the lower class people not be there?

[yby1]

In LA, you can have nice areas and poor areas right next to each other. However, there are more secluded ritzy areas, like Malibu, or even Pacific Palisades that are a good distance from poor areas.

[jm1982]

I agree with yby1.

You can find "poor areas" close to the "rich" ones. These days most of the Westside is pretty removed from 'poor areas'..but on the Westside you still have low income people in apartment buildings for example.

The rich in famous live in different areas...and these days it seems a lot of them are in the valley. Justin Bieber, Kardashians,etc.

There are a lot of low income , mostly immigrants in L.A so you will find them all over the place.

Even in a mostly white area like Brentwood you will see tons of Hispanics that actually do the work.
Because of this the area might look more diverse, but those people don't actually live in the area. This is a big reason why the traffic problem is so bad.
It seems almost every other car is a work truck/repair service/gardener of some kind and they aren't living on the westside for the most part. And of course tons of housekeepers too.

So basically you will see the "lower class" people in these areas because the rich people employee them. Also these people are working in the restaurants, etc too. So you might not see them as your waiter..but they'll be in the back washing dishes or cooking the food or as the busboy.

You will see them at the bus stops in Beverly Hills, Brentwood or any of the other expensive/rich areas.

[True Freedom]

I did not grow up in LA, but found how rapidly a neighborhood can change quite surprising and a little uncomfortable. You can have multi-million dollar houses just a mile or two (or even a few blocks in cases) from ghetto or gang area. LA is very "patchy" in my opinion.
As others have mentioned, there are some areas that are much more contiguously nice. Rancho Palos Verdes/ Rolling Hills, San Marino, West Pasadena, etc are some others that come to mind

[jm1982]

Also the labeling of an area as ghetto is subjective too . It all depends on your perspective or experience . One person's ghetto might be another's "lower middle class area" .

[disgruntled la native]

Generally the wealthier areas and lower income areas are far from to each other. This is unlike other major cities like NYC. The entire westside is pretty much secluded in its own bubble, for example, Pacific Palisades, Bel AIr, Brentwood, and Beverly Hills are nowhere near any lower income, or even middle income areas. West Hollywood is surrounded by Beverly Hills and the upper middle class Beverly Grove and Fairfax Districts. Santa Monica is surrounded by the beach and more and more wealth, except at its southern end, which is still upscale Venice. The wealthier parts of the valley also tend to, at most, border middle class areas.

The exception is in the Hancock Park area. Hancock Park borders Koreatown and Mid-City, so you'll see $5 million mansions on one street, then you cross Wilshire (south) or Wilton (east) and you see drug dealings and cramped apartments. Also, Downtown LA and Hollywood can vary by the street.

[majoun]

Originally Posted by disgruntled la native

Generally the wealthier areas and lower income areas are far from to each other. This is unlike other major cities like NYC. The entire westside is pretty much secluded in its own bubble, for example, Pacific Palisades, Bel AIr, Brentwood, and Beverly Hills are nowhere near any lower income, or even middle income areas. West Hollywood is surrounded by Beverly Hills and the upper middle class Beverly Grove and Fairfax Districts. Santa Monica is surrounded by the beach and more and more wealth, except at its southern end, which is still upscale Venice. The wealthier parts of the valley also tend to, at most, border middle class areas.

The exception is in the Hancock Park area. Hancock Park borders Koreatown and Mid-City, so you'll see $5 million mansions on one street, then you cross Wilshire (south) or Wilton (east) and you see drug dealings and cramped apartments. Also, Downtown LA and Hollywood can vary by the street.

Beverly Hills is nowhere near lower income areas? Forgetting about Cadillac-Corning? Although BH doesn't directly border Cadillac-Corning it is about half a mile from BH's most southeastern point.

The notorious and fearsome Jungle is right near wealthy and upper middle class Baldwin Hills. That's one of the few poor neighborhoods right by an affluent neighborhood that has not been gentrified.

[Ceece]

I know LA is where most of the rich and famous live at.

hmm...

[True Freedom]

Originally Posted by jm1982

Also the labeling of an area as ghetto is subjective too . It all depends on your perspective or experience . One person's ghetto might be another's "lower middle class area" .

Ghetto is subjective. Here, I'll use a few more objective metrics.

in an east pasadena, within a short 9 blocks... home prices went from $350k to $3.5M. That's a 10x increase in price. Homes are bigger, yes, so when you compare price per square foot, prices double in that 9 block span. That's a huge difference, IMHO, in a relatively short distance.

The $350k neighborhood is not ghetto, but certainly has a different look and feel than just a few blocks away.

[jm1982]

True, and it's important to look at the sq footage/land size and not just price as you mentioned.

The east Pasadena example is similar to what you might see in Brentwood....but the 'cheap' houses start at 1.6million or so and then can go up to $20million.

There are some areas like this , but then other areas has more homogenous home prices that don't vary that much. But when new people with money move in they seem to remodel and rebuild and make their homes much bigger. Since land is so valuable, people want to maximize their land value I guess is part of it.

I think it's mostly developers that will buy an older smaller outdated house for the land and then build a big house for someone with money.

Not sure how often it's actually the homeowner that buys the small house and then actually hires out the whole construction.

If you can get a good deal on the house/land and then get the construction done for a good price I guess there could be money to be made.

The bigger you build the less you are paying per sq ft for the land..

An example of this is something like this..they bought land last year for $720k, built new construction (2014) and selling for $2.295 million in MarVista.

If you divide land price by the sq ft of current house (3100sq ft) it is $232sq ft that they paid. So if they built (including actual construction,permits,fees,etc) for $300sq ft (this seems like it would be on the high end?) for example, their total cost per sq ft would be $532sq ft. They are asking $740sq ft. Their profit would be $208 a sq ft , so $644,800.



Of course Marvista wasn't always like this ,but now you can see there are homes for over 2million.

This type of building can only really be done in places that support it. Where there is a demand for bigger newer more expensive homes.