Irvine Housing Blog

Closed Sales from 3/23/2012 to 3/29/2012

Discuss below or at Talk Irvine.

A Review of San Carlos Court at Portola Springs

Recently I was driving through the Laguna Niguel community. I was on my way to a friend’s house, but decided to take a detour and scope out some of the neighborhoods. As I poked around several neighborhoods, I noticed the friendly atmosphere. People waved at me as I drove by. They smiled—even though I was a complete stranger. I know they didn’t recognize my car, but they still made me feel welcome. It was an amazing feeling that I haven’t felt since I was a kid growing up in the Orange Hills area. Neighbors interacted with each other—it was a novel concept. I’ve lived in Irvine for nearly fifteen years, and not once did I really know my neighbors. Most of the time I didn’t want to know my neighbors (and I’m a highly sociable gal). This got me to thinking: what is so different about Portola Springs versus this little neighborhood in Laguna Niguel? My answer was simple: The neighbors weren’t on top of each other. There may not have been a lot of space in between the houses, but there was enough comfortable distance that created privacy. Some neighborhoods in Irvine have this aura—but Portola Springs seems lacking.

I visited San Carlos Court (Overview) on the same day which reaffirmed my observations. San Carlos Court at Portola Springs is a collection of eight different residences centered around a common courtyard. The set up in theory would be cute and has the potential to be family oriented, but my primary concern was privacy. It felt too close for comfort. If anyone remembers the television show Melrose Place back in the 90s, the residents could never seem to hide secrets from each other. That’s how I imagine these places—particularly since new developments seem to be built with paper thin walls. Hopefully you’ll have mild mannered neighbors and this won’t be a problem, but I’m guessing that you’ll be able to hear every party, every dog barking, and every stereo blasting within the walls.

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Irvine Housing by the Numbers - Update

Here is an updated list of the housing numbers for each Irvine neighborhood.  Does anyone care to give an opinion on what these numbers mean?

Sale!  40% off in Westpark

In the gated community of Corta Bella in Westpark where half of the housing inventory is rented, there are two identical two bedroom condominiums for sale. They would make good rental properties, or starter homes. In 2011, these homes had rented between $1900 to $2100 per month. Both have a two car garage on one floor, living/dining spaces and kitchen on another one, and bedrooms on the top floor. The community has a mix of 83% white collar, and 17% blue collar workforce with a median income of $95,883.

Lambert Ranch - Private Preview

Lambert Ranch is a new development that is being built by The New Home Company.  It is located/surrounded by Portola Springs and here is a rough idea of the location (click for a bigger image):

The grand opening is on April 28th, 2012 but they had a private preview event this past weekend. There are a few members in the TI forums who visited and had some feedback:

From kalbi:

Just got back. Checked out The Grove (starting at $1.2 M). Lots are small. Approx 6000 sq ft with about 4300 sq ft in living space. Yard is practically nonexistent. The tour guide was focusing on the "courtyard" as the yard.  Love the downstairs for the most part, love the kitchen island in all floor plans and the great room. Also like the casita (Plan 3 has a HUGE separate casita).  Upstairs left much to be desired.  All secondary bedrooms are rather small. Master bedroom itself is also rather small, bathrooms are decent size.

Also, you can see the 241 from the models as well as the landfill. 

The Hills start at the low mil. Bedrooms are a tad bigger than The Grove bedrooms but again, rather small. 

Overall impression, decent floor plans but would not buy there because of the price and location.

They have one rec room for the association called the "ranch house" with pool and ping pong table. No tennis courts. I guess ping pong for the asians?

From Arman:

Having looked at 100+ model homes over the past several years in Southern California, these are some of the most impressive I've seen. The Hill was nice, but the Grove was quite unique. What's great about these model homes is that every floorplan is different from every other floorplan in the community, unlike Laguna Altura, for example, which are variations on each other, and were exactly the same as floorplans used in other Irvine Pacific developments. As a group, the homes in Lambert Ranch are quite large as well, something else that is unique in today's economy. Will these sell? Who knows. But, if someone's looking for something new and something of this size in Irvine, it's about the only option available. With Orchard Hills MIA for the foreseeable future (and certainly not opening in 2013 as was advertised on the Irvine Company website a couple years ago), I don't know what else may be in the pipeline that may offer something of similar size or quality in the central OC area.

Any thoughts from anyone else who visited?

Discuss below or on the active TI thread.

Closed Sales from 3/15/2012 to 3/21/2012

IRWD Helps Customers Save Water and Money

Most of us would like to live and work in pleasant surroundings. Since that includes the outside as well as the inside, landscaping that requires routine maintenance would be part of the picture. Landscaping requires water, and the more water used on the landscape, the higher the water bill will be. With all the rain we’ve had recently, the idea that we need to watch our water use might seem odd. However, we still live in an environment that is semi-desert, and the competition between various stakeholders for available water continues to grow. None of this will change in the short term or long term. With that in mind, the free giveaway and rebate that the Irvine Ranch Water District (IRWD) is currently offering to its customers are worth taking a look at.