Options Galore? (Santa Barbara, Newport Beach, Laguna Niguel: new home, buy, organic)

[DR750S]

Remember P-u-s-s-y Galore? A 1959 fictional character in the Ian Fleming James Bond novel. She makes a reappearance in the 1964 movie entitled: James Bond, Goldfinger. Bond, always had options when it came to the opposite sex. But, given his need to keep such a low profile, I doubt he had that many options when it came to a place he could call home - and feel comfortable doing it.

We are looking at a relocation that includes the potential for more than just a move from NoCal to SoCal. From West Vancouver to Bellvue Washington Lakes Region, Marbella Spain, Singapore and the Santa Barbara Coast down through Rancho Santa Fe Covenant, there are a lot of areas that have held significant interest for us for many years. Now, that the time has come to start making things happen, the biggest problem seems to be the elimination of places on earth, as opposed to not being able to find enough of them. Its actually pretty frustrating when you stop and think about it.

So, we just bought a new SUV and decided to break it in with a drive down from NoCal to Newport Coast. Well, that did it. We arrived at night and could not see much at all. We woke up the next morning, started looking for some pancakes and nearly crashed given how taken we were with the beauty of the area. It was instant - we fell in love with Newport Coast the moment the sun rose. But, there are so many other places to go see.

We made this 4 day/4 night trip as our first "eval" of the area. We have a ranking system for each area we plan to visit. Newport Coast scored 10 out of 10 in our system. We tried to find things we did not like and couldn't. If you want more 'earth under your feet' just head over to Newport Beach. Tons of places to eat and we never even scratched the surface. We got lost in Fashion Island (at night) and had to ask for directions back to our parking spot. 4 days in Newport is just not enough time - not even close.

We are planning a lifetime relocation. We initially thought about visiting each place once for about 4-5 days as just a primer visit. Ranking the area according to our scoring system and then deciding who makes the cut to the next level which would be a 2-week visit. Rank again. Then reshuffle for the next round which would be a 1 month visit. Then make a decision about where to invest in a new home. By our estimate, this could take 2 full years. That's the downside. The upside is that we will have a much better feel for the area we finally buy into after the whole process is over.

Given so many places of interest, do you have some ideas that we have not yet thought about for evaluating each of them?

Right now, Newport Coast is firmly in the #1 pole position, but we have yet to visit any of the others on the list and you can only do so much with Google Earth. At some point, you have to get boots on the ground to get an organic feel of the place you intend to call home.

[Finper]

Are you talking about the literal Newport Coast where Kobe Bryant lives? Or the Newport coastline? You might want to check out Laguna Beach and La Jolla. Those are nice affluent areas. Can't recommend Malibu it's become a zoo. Just visiting there gives me anxiety

[DR750S]

Originally Posted by Finper

Are you talking about the literal Newport Coast where Kobe Bryant lives? Or the Newport coastline? You might want to check out Laguna Beach and La Jolla. Those are nice affluent areas. Can't recommend Malibu it's become a zoo. Just visiting there gives me anxiety

Yes. Crystal Cove, Pelican Crest, Pelican Hill, all the above and more. The place is gorgeous. The food was good and the pace was relaxed.

However, I will say that I've never seen so many 50, 55 and 60 mph "streets" in all my life. We developed a theory that with so many Supercars and Hypercars per square mile, they had to give them an opportunity to go 0-60 WOT. Its just a theory. I would have to get used to driving 60mph down a "street" with sidewalks, no less.

Kobe, lives there? Had no idea. It figures. It is a very nice area.

Loved the Toll Roads, too. The bill was interesting. I've never racked up that many toll charges in a single day. Not bad, though. The fact that you can pay it online within 5-days is convenient. I guess, if you live there, you can set-up some other kind of arrangement. I just like the fact that there was no traffic on any Toll Road we took this past weekend.

La Jolla, is on the list for us to eval. Unfortunately, were interested in The Farms at La Jolla and from what I can tell, there's never anything for sell in The Farms (such a small patch of homes - but very nice, indeed). Laguna Beach, did not make the list for us - is there something we missed - something we should know about?

We drove through Laguna Niguel, and wondered how we missed it. We quickly added it to the list of SoCal evals.

Very interesting, though. We drove down to Rancho Santa Fe. After covering almost all of it, we were able to remove it from out list. We were shocked. In fact, we drove all the way back to Newport Cost, absolutely stunned that Rancho Santa Fe, did not make the first cut. I'm still blown away by it - and I'm sure at our first dinner tonight since being back home from our first trip to SoCal that we will be talking a lot about Rancho Santa Fe, and how it just fell flat on us.

[Finper]

Originally Posted by DR750S

Yes. Crystal Cove, Pelican Crest, Pelican Hill, all the above and more. The place is gorgeous. The food was good and the pace was relaxed.

However, I will say that I've never seen so many 50, 55 and 60 mph "streets" in all my life. We developed a theory that with so many Supercars and Hypercars per square mile, they had to give them an opportunity to go 0-60 WOT. Its just a theory. I would have to get used to driving 60mph down a "street" with sidewalks, no less.

Kobe, lives there? Had no idea. It figures. It is a very nice area.

Loved the Toll Roads, too. The bill was interesting. I've never racked up that many toll charges in a single day. Not bad, though. The fact that you can pay it online within 5-days is convenient. I guess, if you live there, you can set-up some other kind of arrangement. I just like the fact that there was no traffic on any Toll Road we took this past weekend.

La Jolla, is on the list for us to eval. Unfortunately, were interested in The Farms at La Jolla and from what I can tell, there's never anything for sell in The Farms (such a small patch of homes - but very nice, indeed). Laguna Beach, did not make the list for us - is there something we missed - something we should know about?

We drove through Laguna Niguel, and wondered how we missed it. We quickly added it to the list of SoCal evals.

Very interesting, though. We drove down to Rancho Santa Fe. After covering almost all of it, we were able to remove it from out list. We were shocked. In fact, we drove all the way back to Newport Cost, absolutely stunned that Rancho Santa Fe, did not make the first cut. I'm still blown away by it - and I'm sure at our first dinner tonight since being back home from our first trip to SoCal that we will be talking a lot about Rancho Santa Fe, and how it just fell flat on us.

My friend lives in Rancho. It's a lot of horse property and very superficial uppity people. Not your cup of tea I guess. You should check out Lag Beach. It's crowded but has charm still

[pacific2]

I second the idea of visiting Laguna Beach. I think you'd like it.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4quHcjgECk

[Finper]

Originally Posted by DR750S

Yes. Crystal Cove, Pelican Crest, Pelican Hill, all the above and more. The place is gorgeous. The food was good and the pace was relaxed.

However, I will say that I've never seen so many 50, 55 and 60 mph "streets" in all my life. We developed a theory that with so many Supercars and Hypercars per square mile, they had to give them an opportunity to go 0-60 WOT. Its just a theory. I would have to get used to driving 60mph down a "street" with sidewalks, no less.

Kobe, lives there? Had no idea. It figures. It is a very nice area.

Loved the Toll Roads, too. The bill was interesting. I've never racked up that many toll charges in a single day. Not bad, though. The fact that you can pay it online within 5-days is convenient. I guess, if you live there, you can set-up some other kind of arrangement. I just like the fact that there was no traffic on any Toll Road we took this past weekend.

La Jolla, is on the list for us to eval. Unfortunately, were interested in The Farms at La Jolla and from what I can tell, there's never anything for sell in The Farms (such a small patch of homes - but very nice, indeed). Laguna Beach, did not make the list for us - is there something we missed - something we should know about?

We drove through Laguna Niguel, and wondered how we missed it. We quickly added it to the list of SoCal evals.

Very interesting, though. We drove down to Rancho Santa Fe. After covering almost all of it, we were able to remove it from out list. We were shocked. In fact, we drove all the way back to Newport Cost, absolutely stunned that Rancho Santa Fe, did not make the first cut. I'm still blown away by it - and I'm sure at our first dinner tonight since being back home from our first trip to SoCal that we will be talking a lot about Rancho Santa Fe, and how it just fell flat on us.

Toll roads are a fav of mine too. I have a transponder and pay 50.00 and the toll amount gets deducted from that amount from the transponder reading. When it gets to 15.00 they want another 50.00