Moving to LA, somewhere within 30 mins of Playa Vista (Los Angeles: sales, apartment)

[LAST Cdn]

My husband and I are moving to LA with our toddler. (We're Canadian and British but live in Sweden now.) He got a job in Playa Vista, so we're looking for a good place to live that's no more than a 30-minute commute for him.

My biggest concern is safety. Plus, I'd like to be able to walk to shops, restaurants, the supermarket, etc. A good pre-school nearby is the other necessity. Our budget seems decent, around $1M to buy (rents seem very expensive in the city). We don't want an apartment; my husband wants a house but I'd like a townhouse because it feels safer to me. So we're open to either.

We've been looking at Playa Vista, Marina Del Rey, Mar Vista, Palms, Culver City and Westchester. Thoughts on those neighbourhoods? Any others we should consider? Santa Monica and Venice both seem more expensive, and possibly louder/more transient than we're looking for. We're in our early 40s. I want to feel safe walking with my daughter any time of day and and coming and going at night.

[BRinSM]

$1M will get you a fixer upper in the areas you would consider (for a detached house anyways), except for maybe westchester. If you are new to the area, I'd recommend by renting while you familiarize yourselves with the city.

[JohnG72]

Your budget will go WAY farther in a place like Torrance.

[JustMike77]

You can get a nice 1,600-2,000 sf townhouse in the areas you mentioned for under a million. Beware of Playa Vista, their HOA dues are monstrous. Check out Marina del Rey AWAY from the marina on Mindanao or Alla, there are several townhouse communities there. Also on La Villa Marina, but they're older. Culver City is nice and you might be able to find more child-oriented things there, look on Overland around Raintree. Mar Vista/Palms doesn't have that many townhomes, nor does Westchester. As for a community feeling, take a look at El Segundo just below Imperial south of the airport. I find it to be one of the "cutest" neighborhoods. Every time I go there they're having some community activity going on. Feels very homey to me. I work with the top realtors in the areas you mentioned. If you need a referral to one, just PM me. And no, I don't get anything in return from them.

[echoParkDate]

to the OP, Los Angeles is a very safe city. Reading the news gives you a very distorted perspective on what it's like to live here.

Rents are inflated, yes. But nowhere near as inflated as home prices. Come here, hold your nose and pay exorbitant rent for a year, figure out what areas you like and whether you want to stay long term.

Much better than buying a place and making a mistake.

Agree with the recommendation on El Segundo. A home near downtown ES would fit the bill nicely, but homes there are very expensive.

[NewbieHere]

Westchester probably has homes under a million.

[WizardOfRadical]

I'd go with El Segundo. Not as transient as Venice/Santa Monica, quality schools, and lower crime rate.

Just don't go in the water there, go to Manhattan Beach.

[JohnG72]

Originally Posted by NewbieHere

Westchester probably has homes under a million.

Look at solds on Redfin over the past three months

[Cloudwalker]

Like others have said, I would rent for 6 months to get a proper feel for the surrounding areas. You can get a good idea of general areas to look at prior to arrival, but there are location-specific nuances in every place that are hard to know until you've lived there for a while. Plus, you might get there and find LA generally or the job is not the right fit for you.


As ridiculous as it seems to write this, $1million is actually a fairly modest budget for a single family home on the westside. You can definitely find something for $1m in the areas you listed (except MDR), but be realistic in your expectations. It's likely to be something like a less-than-1200sqft 2/3 bed 1 bath fixer. Take a look at realtor.com or redfin to get an idea of asking prices and recent sales prices (be aware that if it seems like a low asking price, it's probably bait to drive a multiple offer situation that will result in a sale price that is significantly higher than the asking price).


All of the areas you listed are generally pretty safe, especially during the day. As a comparison, I am originally from New Zealand and I feel much more comfortable walking around MDR, Culver City, Mar Vista at night than I ever did walking around most parts of Wellington or Auckland. Venice is different, I generally wouldn't stroll around there at night, but it seems you've excluded that area anyway.


If it were me, I'd rule out El Segundo, Playa Del Rey, and Westchester because of noise and air quality issues, especially with a toddler. El Segundo has a lovely downtown area and a good school district, but it is bordered by LAX, the Chevron oil refinery, and the Hyperion wastewater treament plant. Same thing with PDR and Westchester, but without the good school district (although there are still some good schools in the area). A USC/UW study last year found that the levels of ultra-fine particles (UFP) within 2 miles of LAX and the refinery were up to 10 times higher than other areas of LA. UFP are tiny and get deep in the lungs causing inflammation, strongly correlated to respiratory and cardiovascular issues. Also be careful in Mar Vista and West LA for the same reason, as a UCLA study this year found the same kind of results for areas adjacent to or downwind of Santa Monica Airport. This is not likely to change anytime soon. Unlike Europe, there are no federal standards for UFP.


The Marina area itself is very pricey, but as one of the other posters mentioned, the areas immediately adjacent are much more reasonable (relatively). We bought in Culver West 18 months ago, near the intersection of Washington Place and Centinela, and walk or bike to the marina, the beach, restaurants, supermarkets, farmers market, etc. It's a five minute drive to Playa Vista. Our kids go to school in SM, but if they weren't already settled there, I would have been very happy for them to go to the local school, Short Ave Elementary, which has a strong and active parent community.


Culver City proper would also be good to look at, close, walkable, relatively affordable, and the schools have an ok reputation (generally better than LAUSD). I would also look at Palms, although it's pretty sedate and there are a lot of multi-housing units there, and with the same caveat about schools. And there's possibly a bit more gang-activity there than other westside areas, but still highly unlikely to affect you.


We didn't do preschool here, so can't really comment on that, but there seem to be lots of good options around. I'd be focusing more on future elementary and middle school options. LAUSD gets a bad rap, sometimes justifiably, but there are definitely some great elementary schools in the district. You have to do thorough research because it varies by each individual school. Playa Vista Elementary is a new school, STEM focused, with a great partnership with Loyola Marymount University which is very close by, but they have climbing enrollment, so it may be hard to get into without actually living within the boundaries (which is essentially just the Playa Vista development). You might be able to get an intra-district employment based permit, but not sure if they'll be allowing that next year.


Apologies for the length of this post, but we went through similar process and wanted to pass on our experience. Best of luck!

[Cloudwalker]

Also, if you will need to finance a house purchase, start researching your options now, as it can be tricky for foreign nationals to secure a mortgage if you have no FICO score, no US tax returns, and no US employment history. One of you being Canadian will help a lot as some Canadian banks do cross-border banking, but it's still not that straightforward. The prospective employer may be able to help you too by connecting you with local lenders who specialize in foreign national mortgages. You may have to put down 30-35% and you will probably pay some kind of foreign national points premium as well. Be sure you really check out the history of the lender, as a lot will pre-approve you, only to have financing fall over at the underwriting stage. I'm no fan of mortgage brokers, but in your circumstances it will likely take an experienced broker to successfully navigate you through the tedious, paperwork-heavy process.


If your current bank has a branch in Los Angeles, get them to help you open an LA account now so you can start building a local banking history. They may also be able to help you get a locally-issued credit card which will help start your FICO score. You may already be aware of all this, but it's something a lot of people don't expect to have difficulty with (I know I didn't), so wanted to flag it for you.