Communities

Santa Monica is a beach town at heart. It was built and promoted as a resort destination in the early 1900s when amusement piers were popular, attracting vacationers and well-heeled Easterners looking to resettle in The West. Tourism was Santa Monica's core economy in its early years, an unpredictable source of revenue, subject to broader ... [View]

Echo Park is one of the best neighborhoods in Los Angeles. It’s also one of the earliest. Los Angeles grew in concentric circles from Downtown outward, beginning in the mid 19th century. Echo Park’s proximity to Downtown puts is roughly one rung away from the epicenter of L.A.’s outwardly-expanding bullseye pattern. Echo Park Lake was an ... [View]

More often than not when people say "Los Angeles" they are referring to the entire Greater Los Angeles area, which is enormous (L.A. County alone is 4,751 square miles). It would be a mistake to lump every city, suburb, district, and neighborhood into one amorphous blob as if to suggest the whole region is an undifferentiated mass of people, cars, ... [View]

For a moment, let’s pretend there are only two kinds of people in the world: beach people and hill people. If you love panoramic views and being surrounded by nature, you’re probably a hill person. And if you’re a hill person looking to buy a home in Los Angeles, the Hollywood Hills should top your list of areas to check out. During the day, ... [View]

Beverly Hills is clearly the most famous area in Los Angeles County and perhaps Southern California. It is both a place (a stand-alone municipality within Los Angeles) and a symbol (the embodiment of the entertainment industry, fame, and wealth.) Generations have been introduced to the city through film cameos and music lyrics, from Irving ... [View]

If you ask an Angelino about the best neighborhoods in Los Angeles, you might get 4 million different answers. Some folks love to live near the beach. Some choose a neighborhood based how far it is from their workplace. Others seek the right combination of affordability and safety, even if it means spending a little time stuck in traffic each day. ... [View]