LA is its own weird beast where geology plays a role.
There's a stripe running east west through the center, following the hills and the area immediately south of the hills, from Santa Monica to Griffith Park. That stripe is notably higher priced, with prices within the stripe generally increasing towards the ocean.
Then there's a ring around that stripe where prices decrease for a while, and then move up again to be sort of traditionally suburban in pricing.
And then there's the strange outer regions like Topanga / Calabasas / Malibu, where you move waaaay up the scale again.
LA is hard to figure out. I was around Long Beach a few weeks ago, and it looked like a pretty nice street, but about 5-6 blocks over was another main street that looked like a real ghetto. Also, I was in Pasadena a few months ago, on Lake Avenue south of the 210 it seemed pretty fancy, but as soon as you go over the freeway, still on Lake Avenue, North, you feel like you may not live very long.
There's a stripe running east west through the center, following the hills and the area immediately south of the hills, from Santa Monica to Griffith Park. That stripe is notably higher priced, with prices within the stripe generally increasing towards the ocean.
Then there's a ring around that stripe where prices decrease for a while, and then move up again to be sort of traditionally suburban in pricing.
And then there's the strange outer regions like Topanga / Calabasas / Malibu, where you move waaaay up the scale again.