Alternative to Santa Monica (Culver, Beverlywood, Manhattan) (Los Angeles, Long Beach: low income, crime)

[theguild123]

Hi All,


I'm going to be moving back to LA in about a year from SF, and I've been looking at areas that fit my criteria. I'm a NYC native with an LA native Korean wife, expecting our first child in a few weeks! We want to move closer to her family, and my parents will stay with us part of the year when NYC gets too cold for them.

I previously lived in West Hollywood and Santa Monica, and loved both (in early 20s). I loved NYC and LA and hated SF, and trying to get away from the pacific northwest culture. I'm looking a SFH ~$2-$2.5M with a decent backyard + pool with the following (obviously we can't have all of these)

- An area with good public schools, roads and decent low traffic transport with green areas to walk/bike. If the public schools aren't good, then a cheap enough discount on prices to make up for going to private school
- A city with great food/diverse food options is very important. We used to eat in Koreatown and Sawtelle a lot, as well as places in Downtown and Culver occasionally.
- A safer area without a lot of crime spillover that isn't afraid to address these issues. While California's diversity is great for encouraging culture and cuisine, the live and let life attitude hyper liberal attitude can get very tiring, especially when it contributes/excuses petty crime and urban blight. I'm sick of this in SF
- A younger crowd since we both just turned 28.
- I may build a granny pod for parents, so a good area for senior citizens as well
- Ideally close to Westside, since we both work in tech and jobs may end up there. However a place with good access to other parts of LA as well
- A korean/jewish area would be a big plus
- Not a WASPY area, and not too hipster area. Some cosmopolitan influence would be nice, but doesn't need to be too snooty (a la Beverly Hills).


Given the above, I was looking at North of Montana in Santa Monica (surprise surprise), but this area is just a tad beyond my budget. I was looking for suggestions beyond this area of SM. I included some of the following

Pacific Palisades - Is this too isolated, and how is the retail/food options? Thought this might be too white/WASPY for us
Beverlywood - more Jewish (maybe too much so), surrounding areas meh. Terrible schools. Not far from everything but not close to anything
Hancock Park - older neighbors ?, terrible schools but one or two korean focused elementary schools. Crime spillover more intense
Culver - ?? I know little about this area, I always thought it was hipster but it gets great reviews from people here and its unclear why.


Further away from Santa Monica? Are these too far from LA/westwide or going to be too old of a crowd for us?

Manhattan beach?
Palos Verdes?
Torrance?
Irvine ?

Anywhere else outside of LA city limits worth looking into? Open to more suggestions !

[Cloudwalker]

Culver City ticks most of your boxes.

It has its own school district which is good the whole way from PreK-12th Grade.

It has its own police force which doesn’t put up with homeless encampments at all. There are many streets where it’s easy to see which side is in CC - one side has tents, the other doesn’t.

It generally has decent-sized lots, which gives you more options whencan building an ADU, and there is housing in your price range.

It’s a diverse community in both age and ethnicity, with lots of good food options both in the city and nearby. Close to Beverlywood and Pico/Robertson, not too bad to get to Koretown.

Easy access to many areas of the city via the 10, the 405, and surface streets such as Robertson, La Cienega, Jefferson and Venice. Nice commute if you end up working in SM or Playa Vista.

Manhattan Beach, Palos Verdes, and Irvine are all safe, clean and beautiful with good schools, but they are not exactly known for youth or diversity (although there are pockets that are more mixed) and the commute from any of them could be pretty brutal (not so much MB).

Torrance is a bit more variable. Seems to have decent schools, diverse population, don’t know that there’s much in terms of food, commute could be good, but it will depend on where you are. I’d be concerned about air quality, sandwiched between LAX and a bunch of refineries. No idea about safety/crime.

If you are looking at private school, it’s around $35,000-42,000 pa at private and $9-12,000 for parochial. Prob better in the long term to choose an area with good public schools.

[theguild123]

Thanks !

Am I missing something via Culver City? It gets a lot of love here (and I have added to my list of places to check out), but the schools, like Playa Del Rey have a large % of low income students. This one looks like its in LSUAD though.

El Marino Elementary School & El Rincon Elementary School has a majority Hispanic population and black population. Farragut Elementary School looks better but still has ~14% low income students.

I'm still looking for an area with ambitious, higher income families, though it doesn't need to be the ultra competitive like Beverly Hills. Looking like I may need to look further than Culver and Santa Monica.

[(901)]

Culver city blows. Long beach is the new up n coming place to be imo

[theguild123]

My goal is not to focus on the newest up and coming area. I don't think Long Beach meets any of my criteria..

[(901)]

Originally Posted by theguild123

My goal is not to focus on the newest up and coming area. I don't think Long Beach meets any of my criteria..

In that case I would choose Manhattan beach over anything else you've mentioned. I wouldn't live in culver city even if it was free

[theguild123]

Why Manhattan Beach and why none of the other places?

[Mr. Zero]

Like you, I'm a NYC native, but a bit older. We love Manhattan Beach. In your price range, you should be able to find something in the East MB part of town, where lots are bigger (7500 sqft) with large backyards for pools and casitas/guest units. There are lots of families in the area, and we love the schools.

[(901)]

Originally Posted by theguild123

Why Manhattan Beach and why none of the other places?

Manhattan beach has a very clean feeling. Traffic isn't bad at all and I bet crime is low

Pacific Palisades has nice curb appeal but feels very sterile. The plus is I bet crime is low. It's also hard to get inland from there

Santa Monica has been ruined by the homeless population

Beverlywood/Hancock park are to far inland considering the other choices given.

Irvine is quite a drive. If your going that route I would choose Huntington Beach or even better Newport beach. Laguna beach would also be very nice but again the commute into Los Angeles on a daily basis would cause me to have road rage

This might seem petty, but Torrance wouldn't work for me because I had a business partner screw me whose name was Terrence. Would hate to be reminded of that dude everyday

What other places did you mention?

[theguild123]

Thanks guys. Lets narrow this for the time being to Palisades, Santa Monica & Manhattan.

My concern for Manhattan is that it may be a little WASPY/white and less asian/diverse, as reflected in food scene, as well as skew a little older (late 30s vs us in late 20s). I may be completely wrong about this as the only time I spent here was to go to an awesome raw seafood place (fishing with dynamite ! check it out if you haven't). Also Torrance is nearby which would help alleviate this somewhat. Manhattan does seem to have the best schools by far (seems like Santa Monica school district is falling, with weaker school past elementary compared to strong in Manhattan). Also Manhattan feels a little less cosmopolitan than Santa Monica.

Palisades I don't think I've ever been to, which is probably even more white/waspy than Manhattan, while being less insular/far from Santa Monica/Venice. I'll check this out as well, but what you trade in traffic you may get more isolation.

Surprised you think guys think Beverlywood is too insular. Its the first exit past the 405 going westbound and centrally located.

As for Huntington/Newport, if Manhattan is too waspy/white, then these would be even worse. Irvine is nice but these all probably skew even older than Manhattan.

That leaves SM, Manhattan, Palisades, and Beverlywood for now. Any other suggestions I might be overlooking?