Pacific Palisades was a sleepy, middle class neighborhood back then. Not the rich, celebrity enclave it later became.
Same with all of our small, sleepy little bucolic towns on the San Francisco Peninsula. Then Big Tech arrived and created untold wealth. Now 30 year old couples buy a modest little ranch house on a quarter acre built in 1950, for $4 million tear it down and spend another $4 million on a new building.
This isn’t the nice post WW II world I was born into.
Had an uncle who after WWII, stayed in LA, rather than return to (now rust belt) PA. Married a local girl whose father farmed watermelons at what is now Manhattan Beach. They kept a few parcels which have slowly been sold off
My uncle was an accountant for the LA Govt. Very average middle class, although I always envied by cousins who lived the life of the Beach Boys.
House prices in their old neighborhood are now $5-$10 million.
“Pacific Palisades was a sleepy, middle class neighborhood back then. Not the rich, celebrity enclave it later became”
This is why few people who live in inherited houses in Pacific Palisades will be able to rebuild. They may get a lot of money for their land from developers or a much smaller amount if the government invokes the (IMHO) misguided Supreme Court Kelo decision and takes their land. The wonderful life they had there is over.