My Personal LA Neighborhood Stories

I LOVE LA

I have been a Santa Monica resident for 16 years. First, living in the heart of Dogtown off Main Street and currently in the Wilshire-Montana corridor with my wife and son.

I was born and raised in Los Angeles in the Pico/Robertson area near Beverlywood.

I have a BA in Communication from UC Santa Barbara and an MA in Communication from the University of Arizona. I’ve worked in higher education teaching and research at Claremont Graduate University. I co-founded an e-Commerce retail store as a garage business and grew it into a full-time enterprise.

Becoming a REALTOR® has been one of the

best experiences of my life.

Every day I am able to combine my love of LA living and architecture with my deep-rooted local knowledge and passion for teaching and problem solving. The happiness and satisfaction of my clients is of primary importance to me, and I won't stop until our journey is successful.

If you have a question about LA living or real estate, or if you just want to get the real inside scoop of any part of LA, please contact me on my cell (323)736-2276. I'd love to hear from you! - Mike

WILSHIRE-MONTANA

Though it’s primarily composed of multi-family condos and apartment buildings, this neighborhood is a little quieter and less busy than the areas South of Wilshire. You’ll find residents strolling or biking West to enjoy ocean views at Palisades Park, or North to shopping and dining along Montana Avenue.

Wilshire-Montana is where you’ll find two of the highest regarded elementary schools in the Santa Monica School District: Roosevelt Elementary and Franklin Elementary (my son attended Roosevelt and had a great experience). It’s also where one of Santa Monica’s two Middle Schools, Lincoln Middle School, is located.

This is where my family moved when we found out we were having a kid and needed to expand from a 1-bedroom apartment to a 2-bedroom home. We absolutely love it!

OCEAN PARK

To me, Ocean Park is where Santa Monica really shows its Bohemian/beach community side. In other areas of Santa Monica, the freeway serves as a barrier to beach access…but here in Ocean Park, it’s much more direct; the distance of a couple flat blocks is all that separates a pleasant cafe lunch and relaxing on the sand.

Main Street is this area’s vibrant business district, filled mostly with independent boutique shops, bars, and restaurants. Pub crawls, window shopping, and stops for sweet or savory snacks are the order of a typical laid-back day.

Ocean Park is where I lived when my wife and I got engaged and it will forever hold a special place in my heart - filled with happy memories of sunshine and that cool beachside environment. Some of my favorite spots are Holy Guacamole for super tasty casual Mexican food, Urth Caffe for fresh, organic bites, and Dolcenero for some great Italian gelato.

SUNSET PARK

One of the two primary areas for single family homes in Santa Monica, Sunset Park is located East of Ocean Park and South of Pico Blvd down to the Venice border. Grant Elementary and Will Rogers Elementary are both here, as is John Adams Middle School (known locally as JAMS) and Santa Monica College. There’s a small boutique business district on Ocean Park between 16th and 18th that’s great for a quick bite or an ice cream treat (Handel’s or Yoga-urt).

Some parts of Sunset Park feature flat, perpendicular streets where residents have block parties in the summertime. Others are situated on a descending hill that offers long Southerly views. Either way, it’s an outstanding option if you’re looking for a single family house in Santa Monica and are priced out of the high-end North-of-Montana neighborhood.

COLLEGE STREETS

Most North/South Streets in Santa Monica are numbered lowest-to-highest starting at the ocean. North of the 10 Freeway, the numbering stops at 26th and then streets are named after famous colleges - Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and Berkeley. In the College Streets North of Wilshire lies Franklin Hill - on which sit single family homes that command long city and ocean views.

One of my favorite listings I sold a few years ago was a wonderfully cute 1923 Craftsman style single family house on Arizona between Stanford and Berkeley. That stretch, and a number of others in the College Streets South of Wilshire, features beautiful mature trees that form a shady canopy over the road.

NORTH OF MONTANA

The creme of the crop, as they say! This area is mostly laid out on a grid and filled with single family homes on sizable lots. Here you’ll find everything from early 20th Century Spanish and Craftsman homes to cutting edge architectural wonders. It’s peaceful and generally quiet - with one notable exception being the annual Halloween Night celebration which draws major crowds who ogle at the Hollywood movie-grade house decorations while trick-or-treating.

Although you can’t really go wrong North of Montana, there’s one area that’s especially nice - Gillette’s Regent Square between 17th and 21st. Named after razor magnate King Gillette who developed the land in the early 20th Century, this section features extra large flat lots around 9,000 square feet each.

This is where I helped one of my buyer clients get into a stunning 1926 Spanish style home with wonderful original details that’s appreciated nearly $1M since they purchased it a little over 5 years ago!