Looking for safe places to live near LA

[Anonymous]

Looking for cheaper and safe place to live and buy a house about 2-3 hrs drive from LA
Budget max 500k, would prefer less.
Also need good public school district
Someone suggested Bakersfield, is it good?
Any other recommendations?

[Anonymous]

Bako is not good. Clovis is another 2 hours north of Bakersfield but much better. You might consider Las Vegas/Henderson at that budget although with bad traffic that drive can get 6 hours plus on the weekends.

[Anonymous]

Granada Hills in Northern LA County.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bako is not good. Clovis is another 2 hours north of Bakersfield but much better. You might consider Las Vegas/Henderson at that budget although with bad traffic that drive can get 6 hours plus on the weekends.

Bakersfield is the pits. Henderson is more than two hours from LA with traffic, which there always is.

Try Temecula.

[Anonymous]

Oxnard - half way between LA and Santa Barbara

[Anonymous]

I second Oxnard to the north, and Temecula to the...southeast.

If you are talking about 3 hours, I think San Diego is do-able but i don't know the area re prices

[Anonymous]

I live in LA. Bakersfield is known as the the armpit of California. It’s full of white trash Trumpers with lifted trucks and bad teeth. It’s the most disgusting place I have ever been. I broke up with a boyfriend because he loved and we had to do long distance, and I refused to go back to Bako.

[Anonymous]

Ok....I need to balance to the Bakersfield criticism. I personally would not want to live there: it’s hot. Very hot. It smells like cow manure. The air feels polluted. However—-there are nice areas of Bakersfield. There are poor sections, but there is a good size middle class and UMC population as well. Lots of golf courses, country clubs, churches. Bakersfield is an agriculture community. It feels a bit like Texas. Cheap housing.

[Anonymous]

Definitely Temecula

[Anonymous]

My choice would be Frazier Park. It's definitely a small town (about 2000 people) but is only about 70 miles from downtown LA. It's at 4500 feet elevation so no hot summers but there is some snow in winter.

Some places near Oxnard will also have homes in your price range, like Santa Paula, Ventura, Moorpark, and Fillmore. Antelope Valley (Lancaster/Palmdale) will also have options and is on a Metrolink line to downtown, but quite hot and crime situation isn't the greatest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bako is not good. Clovis is another 2 hours north of Bakersfield but much better. You might consider Las Vegas/Henderson at that budget although with bad traffic that drive can get 6 hours plus on the weekends.

I love that you just suggested a town with a 4 hour commute to L.A. with a straight face.

That's 8 hours a day on the road - I don't even know if its possible to survive that.

[Anonymous]

Pasadena / Altadena and Glendale to the north east of LA.

[Anonymous]

Not happening with that budget. Sorry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pasadena / Altadena and Glendale to the north east of LA.

Homes there are at least $1m.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bako is not good. Clovis is another 2 hours north of Bakersfield but much better. You might consider Las Vegas/Henderson at that budget although with bad traffic that drive can get 6 hours plus on the weekends.

I love that you just suggested a town with a 4 hour commute to L.A. with a straight face.

That's 8 hours a day on the road - I don't even know if its possible to survive that.

Not the PP you’re quoting, but OP asked for a place within a 2-3 hour drive to L.A. (didn’t say anything about commuting there daily — or about working there at all). And if a work commute is in the mix, it would have made sense to specify where the job in L.A. is located because that could make a dramatic difference in drive times to some of these suggestions.