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Hi, I am looking for any input on how is life at Imperial Beach. I don't mind hispanic, Asian or Black people as I beleive that we all can contribute positively to our society.
Southern California is attractive to me primary because of the nice weather year round but, I know that weather comes with a price!
Searching around, I found that IB is a nice small coastal place with an smaller price tag especially in the housing market.
I am a single woman, very independent and I will be relocating from the east coast to the west coast.
Have dogs so, its a most that this place is animal friendly.
Can anyone give me a head up regarding nice neighborhoods, hospitals, activities to do ( I love the outdoors!), safety, shopping malls, car and home insurance?
Thanks in advance for your information.
Hava a nice week and stay cool! Here in my city will be upper 90's for the rest of the week....
Campesina
I live in San Diego County and spend a lot of time in IB, so I'll give you my impressions.
Imperial Beach is an interesting community. I would describe it as having a more working class feel. According to the US Census Bureau, 49% of the population is Hispanic/Latino, 36% is non-Hispanic White, 7% are Asian and 4.4% are African American (the rest are other races). A lot of Navy personnel and their families also live in IB. So, unlike many other beach communities in San Diego, you will find it to be a very diverse place to live.
The city itself is a mix of strip malls, small apartment complexes, and single family homes. There is a shopping center near the 5 freeway that has a Wal Mart and there is a discount outlet center near the border in San Ysidro, but the closest real "malls" with shopping other than Wal Mart, outlet stores, or thrift stores would be in Chula Vista, Downtown San Diego or Mission Valley (about a 35 minute drive from IB).
In recent years, the city of IB has made efforts to really revitalize different parts of the city, and the beach area itself has really benefited from this the most. However, other parts of IB can still have a little bit of a run down feel, so may not be for everyone. IB also has a growing homeless population, but that is true of many communities in San Diego County. You may already know this but because IB is so close to Mexico, the beach has more water closures due to pollution than other beaches in San Diego, although this has improved in recent years.
As a dog owner, you'll LOVE the south end of Seacoast drive, where you can take your dogs (on leash only!) onto the beach and walk for a long time without any crowds. I take my dog down there regularly and like it better than other "dog beaches" because it doesn't get rowdy.
Overall, I feel safe in IB during the day but I mainly go there to hang out around the beach area or visit the Tijuana Estuary Preserve. The pier is really nice, and if you walk out on it often, you will start to recognize "the regulars" who hang out there. That part of IB has a very laid back feel, although there can sometimes be more "shady" characters hanging out there, so I wouldn't go there by myself late at night (I am also a female)
The safest and nicest areas to live in IB will be the areas closest to the pier, but those will often be the more expensive housing (both buying and renting) too. One thing to know is that there is a Navy Helicopter base in IB, and the helicopters fly directly over the southern parts of the beach area and the apartments in that area get to enjoy the noise of helicopters going overhead. A lot of the less expensive "beach apartments" in IB will be located in that area for this reason, so be sure to visit and see if the noise will bother you. (If you look on a map, you can see where the Naval facility is located by the Estuary. )
IB has other less desirable areas close to the 5 freeway and Saturn Avenue that you will want to be more careful about. I would suggest using crimemapping.com to get a sense of the crime around any addresses you are considering (be sure to set the time to the last six months as the default will only give you a week's worth of data).
One potential downside to IB is that it is not very convenient for getting to other parts of San Diego County quickly. So, whether IB makes sense for you will depend on where you will be working.
Overall, I think IB is a nice community, but it is VERY different from other beach communities in San Diego. So, I would recommend that you visit and stay in the new Marriott on Seacoast in IB for a few days to see if it is the right place for you.
If you are looking for a beach lifestyle, you may also want to look at Point Loma, Ocean Beach and Pacific Beach, where prices really aren't all that much more costly. Those are more central locations for getting to other places in San Diego and things like shopping malls, entertainment, and outdoor activities in the rest of the county. Keep in mind, however, that *most* areas of San Diego County aren't very far from a beach, so consider saving a bit of money by looking a little inland as well. You may also find more rentals that allow dogs inland than by the coast. If you're buying a home, and not just renting, you'll find homes with larger yards inland too, which may be better for your dogs.
Again, post your question in the San Diego forum and you likely will get more replies.
Last edited by Count David; 07-25-2016 at 08:30 AM..
Here are some previous discussions about IB from the San Diego County forum that you may find helpful. You can find pages of other threads by using the Advanced Search (look at the top of the page), choosing the San Diego County forum in California, and then using the search term "Imperial Beach." You may also want to do a search for the term "South Bay" as that is the area where IB is located.
Here are some previous discussions about IB from the San Diego County forum that you may find helpful. You can find pages of other threads by using the Advanced Search (look at the top of the page), choosing the San Diego County forum in California, and then using the search term "Imperial Beach." You may also want to do a search for the term "South Bay" as that is the area where IB is located.
After reading that third article, IB doesn't sound so great. Yikes....
IB is definitely changing. It used to be that you could find real bargains close to the beach there, but now the prices have spiked and anything "cheap" near the beach is likely to have "issues." There are a surprising number of homes and condos for sale in the $700,000 plus range there these days. I like spending time in IB, but if I'm going to spend that kind of money, I'd rather live elsewhere.
Also, it was just announced today that the new strip mall they're building is having trouble getting enough retail tenants, so the developer is proposing putting in a new hotel there instead. They're also putting in another high rise hotel on the beach. That might be positive, but the locals don't sound like they see it that way. It sounds like IB's days as a sleepy working class beach town may be coming to an end. See: Hotel plan surprises Imperial Beach locals | San Diego Reader
Anyone who spends much time in IB is used to seeing the flooding in certain areas, but it sounds like it will get worse in coming years. I've read articles saying Coronado will face the same challenges. Who knows? Maybe Chula Vista will be "ocean front" eventually.
IB is definitely changing. It used to be that you could find real bargains close to the beach there, but now the prices have spiked and anything "cheap" near the beach is likely to have "issues." There are a surprising number of homes and condos for sale in the $700,000 plus range there these days. I like spending time in IB, but if I'm going to spend that kind of money, I'd rather live elsewhere.
Also, it was just announced today that the new strip mall they're building is having trouble getting enough retail tenants, so the developer is proposing putting in a new hotel there instead. They're also putting in another high rise hotel on the beach. That might be positive, but the locals don't sound like they see it that way. It sounds like IB's days as a sleepy working class beach town may be coming to an end. See: Hotel plan surprises Imperial Beach locals | San Diego Reader
Anyone who spends much time in IB is used to seeing the flooding in certain areas, but it sounds like it will get worse in coming years. I've read articles saying Coronado will face the same challenges. Who knows? Maybe Chula Vista will be "ocean front" eventually.
Haha, that's funny about Chula Vista. Oceanside used to be the "sleepy blue collar town" of North County until people thought the "riff raff" needed to be removed. It still stays somewhat true to its roots with classic cars, soul minded people, and a "work hard play hard" mentality. It'll be gone in the near future though. Everyone seems to think hi-rise hotels and cute little village shops are the answer. I have nothing against those things, but do not want them taking over either. It brigns too many little old ladies who think everything should their way and more outlet malls shoudl ensue.
A lot of people will tell you that it's this terrible, terrible place, filled with nothing but gang bangers and some really will have you believe that there's also many members of Mexican drug cartels that live there. And also that it's dangerous to walk the streets at night and you'll get jacked or your car will get stolen, etc.
The truth is, it's really not a bad place to live at all. I lived there for a year between October 2010 and October 2011. Myself and 2 other guys from Jersey moved out there, mainly for the surf. They had friends in Pacific Beach and we were originally going to move there or to Ocean Beach. The problem was that we needed a 3 bedroom, and couldn't find many that were anywhere near affordable in those two places. So we settled on the Imperial Beach Gardens apartments! Finding somewhere to take their pets was also a problem, and this place was pet friendly. They had animals, so we needed a pet friendly place.
The reviews for this place aren't very good, but we never had a problem there in the short year we lived there. I think we got a 3 bedroom for like $2000 or so a month. Not bad for 3 guys and much cheaper than some of the more ''Desirable'' beach towns up north of there. It's only like a half a mile walk to the pier and maybe a third of a mile just to the beach at the end of Imperial Beach blvd. It's safe too, in fact, they used to walk their dogs at night and I'd go with them sometimes. Even at 1:00, 2:00, 3:00 AM or later. There are a lot of Mexican's there and lots of low riders and lots of Spanish being spoken there. I've gotten unintentionally rude with a few that were speaking Spanish to me, just because I didn't understand them and didn't realize they would be speaking Spanish until after a few words, thus why I could not understand them. Which I'm absolutely fine with them, I just don't know Spanish or wanna learn it.
It's a pretty safe place though. At least that part of town was. Once you get further from the beach, it gets a little more sketchy. When you get into the East part of the town, it's a not so great area. Closer to I-5. As has already been mentioned, there's sometimes water advisories for the ocean. I remember an old surfer telling us a story of how he went surfing one day there back in the 80's (or maybe even 70's) and saw what appeared to be a table drifting toward him, that turned out to be a dead cow floating around. I've seen some tables and debris floating around myself while surfing there.
Our stay there was only a year, as one of the guys got a really good job offer in Los Angeles. So the 3 of us moved up to Redondo Beach, where the rent was almost $3500 a month for a 3 bedroom there. He agreed to pay more towards the rent than the two of us, as he by far had the highest paying job and was a registered nurse at UCLA. So we all moved there, or else we would have never moved. I eventually moved to Jacksonville Florida, after a job offer of my own, 2 years after that.
Here is a link to where we lived. There's reviews of bed bugs and roaches on yelp or whatever site it is. We never had that problem or saw a single bug there, but that was 5 years ago now.
IB is definitely changing. It used to be that you could find real bargains close to the beach there, but now the prices have spiked and anything "cheap" near the beach is likely to have "issues." There are a surprising number of homes and condos for sale in the $700,000 plus range there these days. I like spending time in IB, but if I'm going to spend that kind of money, I'd rather live elsewhere.
Also, it was just announced today that the new strip mall they're building is having trouble getting enough retail tenants, so the developer is proposing putting in a new hotel there instead. They're also putting in another high rise hotel on the beach. That might be positive, but the locals don't sound like they see it that way. It sounds like IB's days as a sleepy working class beach town may be coming to an end. See: Hotel plan surprises Imperial Beach locals | San Diego Reader
Anyone who spends much time in IB is used to seeing the flooding in certain areas, but it sounds like it will get worse in coming years. I've read articles saying Coronado will face the same challenges. Who knows? Maybe Chula Vista will be "ocean front" eventually.
I have been vacationing in IB since 2011, driving in from Phoenix. I love the place!
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It still stays somewhat true to its roots with classic cars, soul minded people, and a "work hard play hard" mentality. It'll be gone in the near future though. Everyone seems to think hi-rise hotels and cute little village shops are the answer. I have nothing against those things, but do not want them taking over either. It brigns too many little old ladies who think everything should their way and more outlet malls shoudl ensue. 
