Comments on: Arcadia vs Pasadena - $750,000

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 19:46:54 +0000

Read closer, they DON’T WANT to pay $750,000 for a home. We are actually budgeting better than those who make less and spend more for a house. We budget to live a balanced life. There’s more to experience in life than mortage payments and commuting.

By: Builder

Builder — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 02:52:33 +0000

PUSD sucks. Most public schools do, with the only alternative being La Canada and the Asian schools (San Marino & Arcadia) which present their own disadvantages. Pasadena and East Altadena are great communities, however I don’t know a single kid that does not go to private school (Pasadena has the largest number of private schools in the western US.) The infill area between La Canada and Lake Avenue, north of Altadena Drive, have great nieghborhoods that will increase in value more than other communities in the comming years. Only downside is the schools, and public schools for actual American citizens will soon be a thing of the past anyways.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 19:10:36 +0000

combined, you make $200K and complained you can’t afford 3/4 million dollar home! Why don’t you drop the BWM or MB (insert other luxury brand) you’re driving. What this sort of income perhaps you need to pay someone to help you budget better. charge it to you credit card if you can’t afford it.

By: KY

KY — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 23:54:13 +0000

My understanding is that house price only goes up because of inflation.
So if inflation is 3%/year, then the house appreciates 3%/year.

There’s nothing intrinsic in a house that increases its value. Not like company stock that has earnings growth.
Of course home improvements and speculation do increase the price.

another way to calculate rough value is multiply
Comparable monthly rent by a Gross Rent Multiplier (150-180). i think this was discussed by TheArcadian/SBG in one of their posts. IrvineRenter has an excellent breakdown/explanation of the GRM at http://www.irvinehousingblog.com/blog/comments/rent-versus-own/

By: tracker

tracker — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:53:37 +0000

Glad the zip code tip helped =)

I am curious to know how you guys calculate the true value of a home.

Do you take the pre-1999 sales info (if its available) and add 2-3% appreciation for each year plus inflation to that?

What’s the right formula?

By: mm

mm — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:51:42 +0000

I totally agree with you Mark. I’m an Asian so I know exactly what you mean “driving kids to perform well in school”. Most of us do well because we have pressure from our parents since we’re 1st grader. They especially good at giving you impression that if you don’t do good, it’s disgrace to the whole family stuff, I guess it works!

I’m lucky enough to grow up in Asia which makes me have most foundation built well from “memorizing chapters”, yet I have my BS and MS here which gave me another thought of critical thinking and creativity. I hope I’ll teach my kids differently in the future since I don’t have any yet, and hopefully more and more Asian kids won’t only give people impression of memorizing chapters well but also their creativity and leadership in the future.

By: mm

mm — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:40:37 +0000

I sure like South Pasadena and San Marino. But with the arboretum, mall, shops, and walking distance to get most thing around, I’ll say I like Arcadia more.

Me and my boyfriend drove to see a condo in South Pasadena the other day. From the pictures and the asking price, that condo is pretty decent as in S Pasadena at that time. But my boyfriend said he doesn’t like the fact that within the walking radius, all we can see is houses. It’s boring he said. And he was the one who wanted to find a nice place near downtown.

So I guess it depends on your needs. To me, I think for the combination of area, price, school district, safety, and convince, Arcadia still rank the best in 20-mile radius from downtown LA. I mean best combination, of course that includes price factor.

By: KY

KY — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 14:36:36 +0000

Great tip, i’ve been trying to do searches for Playa Vista, but it’s way off. Searching by the zip is much more accurate.

By: sgv

sgv — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 14:28:41 +0000

As these are all homes currently listed at the above “wish” prices, this analysis is pretty useless. That Whitefield property was recently listed above $1mm…a meaningless number until the property sells. And since it is moments away from foreclosure (NOD filed in march), it likely won’t even transfer at $750k…

A better analysis would be to look at similar sized homes with similar amenities in the different neighborhoods, and see at what prices these comparable homes sell. That will paint a more realistic picture of what the difference in valuation is in these different neighborhoods.

By: Mark

Mark — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 07:54:17 +0000

From Pasadena & South Pasadena to downtown is a great 15-20 minute commute door to door via the 110 — excellent for professionals like my wife who work in the high rise buildings downtown.

From Arcadia, the commute to downtown would be 30-40 minutes at least. Multiply this 5x per week, 50x per year, x years till retirement and it adds up to many days of your life thrown away commuting.

I have clients all over the L.A. area and Pasadena is very central overall. I just avoid rush hours…Arcadia would add 10-30 minutes to my commute anywhere that my clients are (Burbank, Encino, El Segundo).

While we will be sending our kids to private school in Pasadena because we’re fortunate enough to be able to afford it (we’re looking at Mayfield and Polytechnic), I think Pasadena public schools get too much of a bad rap and Arcadia and San Marino public schools in particular get too good of a reputation.

The reason that public schools in Arcadia and San Marino do so well at state-administered standardized tests has to do mostly with the 50%+ Asian population that attends them. Asian parents do a great job at driving their kids to perform well at school, and Asian students are great at memorizing chapters of material and thus do very well in fill-in-the-correct-checkbox standardized tests.

White Flight occurred in Pasadena Public schools when federal courts ordered their desegregation in 1970 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight). That White Flight caused a disproportionate amount of economically disadvantaged Latino and African-American students to make up the vast majority in Pasadena Unified School districts. Due to socio-economic issues, the Pasadena Unified School District student body as a whole doesn’t do well on standardized tests. Individual students of any race with involved parents who drive their kids to excel in school do well even in “bad” school districts like Pasadena.

If you were to exchange an entire group of Asian students from
Arcadia and transplant them to Blair High School in Pasadena, they would still score equally well in standardized tests…I would bet big on that!

Parent involvement is extremely important in the success of a child’s education. If you aren’t going to be involved in motivating and tutoring your kids to perform well in school, they wont. We have a lot to learn from the Asian parents who drive their kids to excel in cities such as Arcadia and San Marino. We should stop giving so much of the credit to the “great school district” and instead give the credit to the great parents and students.