Are the Valley, and West LA largely middle class and above (Los Angeles: homes, neighborhoods)

[Astral_Weeks]

Originally Posted by Howiester

Valley Village is nice if you like McMansions next to tiny homes
Northridge is ghetto, have you been to the Northridge Mall lately?
Lake Balboa is Van Nuys with a new name

You have a very strange and broad definition of ghetto. Northridge is not ghetto.

Lake Balboa, regardless of past inclusion in Van Nuys, is a solid middle class area. Not fancy or swanky like Studio City but nowhere near ghetto. Valley Village is ghetto because the homes are too small ? Or it is not all uniform/cookie cutter like Santa Clarita...no, I don't agree.

And yes, I grew up in the San Fernando Valley and have family/relatives that still reside there. So I am quite familiar with it.

[West of Encino]

Originally Posted by jm1982

The San Fernando Valley and the Westside are both pretty large areas.

I used to live on the Westside..and now I'm in the Valley.

I'd say the "floor" for housing on the Westside is considerably higher than in the Valley.

It's possible to buy a decent sized house in the valley for under $500,000... on the Westside that's not available.

There are still low income people in some westside areas though either just with low rent, or they bought their homes years ago or they are on section 8 ,etc.

Just like in NYC , even in Manhattan there are poor people living very close to rich people, due to rent control and social programs,etc.

A lot of people say the middle class and poor are getting pushed out and I do feel that is pretty true. Especially in terms of home ownership.

A salary that would make one middle class in some other cities , could make one feel poor in L.A

This is one of many articles that describes the situation

Barely 1 in 5 L.A. homes affordable to middle class, study finds - LA Times

Article was also from a year ago..so things are likely worse now.

Hard to find a house under 400-500k anywhere in Los Angeles these days, unless it's in a not-so-decent neighborhood.

[NJ Brazen_3133]

So it would seem that most of the Valley, and West LA are at least middle class right? And it is the East side that is lower income. From what I know, the Valley, and West LA make up the majority of LA.

Is it safe to say than that LA is pretty solidly middle class then? And all the poverty areas you hear about in the news are separate cities bordering LA. It seems NYC, and Chicago have more swaths of lower income areas than LA.

In East LA is Downtown and Chinatown right? Are those areas considered lower income?

[SupBro]

Originally Posted by NJ Brazen_3133

So it would seem that most of the Valley, and West LA are at least middle class right? And it is the East side that is lower income. From what I know, the Valley, and West LA make up the majority of LA.

Is it safe to say than that LA is pretty solidly middle class then? And all the poverty areas you hear about in the news are separate cities bordering LA. It seems NYC, and Chicago have more swaths of lower income areas than LA.

In East LA is Downtown and Chinatown right? Are those areas considered lower income?

There are areas of LA City that are definitely lower working class like Westlake and McArthur Park. There are also areas that are completely ghetto like skid row.


East LA and Chinatown are working class areas and there are similar areas in the SF Valley like Pacoima or Panorama City.

[WizardOfRadical]

Originally Posted by NJ Brazen_3133

So it would seem that most of the Valley, and West LA are at least middle class right? And it is the East side that is lower income. From what I know, the Valley, and West LA make up the majority of LA.

Is it safe to say than that LA is pretty solidly middle class then? And all the poverty areas you hear about in the news are separate cities bordering LA. It seems NYC, and Chicago have more swaths of lower income areas than LA.

In East LA is Downtown and Chinatown right? Are those areas considered lower income?

LA is mostly working class

[bruhms]

The valley is not...

[NJ Brazen_3133]

You would think then the public schools should be much better.

[erin_elise_]

Originally Posted by NJ Brazen_3133

You would think then the public schools should be much better.

many middle/upper middle class people that live in LA city do not put their kids in their neighborhood zoned schools.( at least the middle/high schools). therefore, many of the public schools in LA DO NOT accuratley represent the neighborhoods' demographics.

HOWEVER, charter schools have been seeing an increase in middle class/upper class families that would otherwise opt for private schools, which is very interesting. (i.e. look at Palisades High, an LAUSD public charter high school that has very good ratings). In the 90s, before Palisades was charter, the school had some challenging times. This is also seen in El Camino High School, an LAUSD high school in Woodland Hills and the charter high school in Porter Ranch.

[radiolibre99]

Most of LA is working class. Middle class to me are the cookie cutter master planned areas like Valencia and Santa Clarita or out in the OC. Those are the middle class burbs I guess. The rest of LA is huge swaths of working class neighborhoods, pockets of real solid middle class and the rest a range of upper middle class to all the way to out in the stratosphere uber-rich.
These eeking class areas aren't ghetto or all dangerous, they're just older areas.

[jm1982]

Originally Posted by SupBro

There are areas of LA City that are definitely lower working class like Westlake and McArthur Park. There are also areas that are completely ghetto like skid row.


East LA and Chinatown are working class areas and there are similar areas in the SF Valley like Pacoima or Panorama City.

Los Angeles is such a big city. It seems even people that were raised here don't realize they live in the city of L.A . I know in the valley a lot of people will reference "L.A" as being Downtown L.A ...not sure how or why that started. I'm like.. "You LIVE in L.A!"

You hear people saying stuff like "Our business is located in the city of Reseda" ...great except there is no city of Reseda..it's a neighborhood in city of Los Angeles.

In many parts of the country these neighborhoods would be their own city. I think things would be run a lot better for people if there was more local control and there would be more a sense of community and identity.

The problem is that Reseda has to fight for attention from the city or mayor with hot areas like DTLA, Silverlake, the Westside, Hollywood,etc etc.