Price, Convenience Act Like a Magnet : Lincoln Heights: Asian and Latino immigrants are attracted by same forces that keep present residents from leaving.
Sylvia Arias has spent only eight months of her life away from the downtown Los Angeles community of Lincoln Heights. And that move 12 years ago is the last one the 37-year-old housewife and mother of two plans to make for many years to come.
“It’s very comfortable here,” Arias says. “We know people who’ve seen us grow up. They helped guide us and they still are looking out and taking care.”
Arias and her husband, Roberto, 40, a downtown T-shirt and sports jacket vendor, share a one-bedroom, one-bath apartment with their 10-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son.
In August, they became first-time home owners, buying the three-unit apartment building they live in and adjoining front house for $232,500.
Before the purchase, the couple flirted with leaving city life and buying a home outside urban Los Angeles, but decided instead to stay near family and friends.
And living next door to Sylvia’s parents couldn’t put them any closer to family, a definite advantage for Arias.
“It’s great in that I have built-in baby sitters,” Arias laughed. “Or if I run out of milk at 10 o’clock at night, hey, I can call Mom.”
The Arias’ choice to stay close to home is a fairly common one in Lincoln Heights, according to Ron Boltz, a realtor with Steve Kasten Properties.
“There is quite a percentage of people who are born and raised here who still like to stay,” Boltz said. “So rather than move away, they look to buy here and improve what they’ve purchased.”
Like the Arias family, many of the newest Lincoln Heights homeowners are first-time buyers, attracted by its relatively affordable prices, downtown convenience and mix of Victorian homes and California bungalows.
The average two-bedroom, one-bath house in Lincoln Heights starts at about $150,000. Larger three-bedroom, two-bath homes range from $165,000 to $225,000. Vacant lots cost between $10,000 and $60,000.
Within minutes of downtown Los Angeles, Lincoln Heights is bordered by the Los Angeles River to the west, Montecito Heights to the north, El Sereno to the east and Boyle Heights to the south.
The more-desirable property is located in the better-maintained flat-land portion of Lincoln Heights, which is closest to the commercial strip along North Broadway and easily accessible to public transportation.
The area’s affordable rentals and downtown-close location have turned it into a magnet for many of the city’s newest Asian and Latino immigrants.
Joseph Wong, manager of Charter 1 Realty in Lincoln Heights, says most of his clients are Vietnamese and Chinese immigrants who work in the downtown garment district.
“Lincoln Heights residents want to live close to downtown and Chinatown and that’s the main reason they buy,” Wong said. “We’re close to shops, markets and banks.”
“It is a good place for us,” agreed elementary school teacher assistant Cheng-Jern Ng, who recently bought the house he had rented for the past seven years. “It’s convenient for my wife to take the bus to go to her job downtown and the school I work for is near my house.”
Ng and his wife, Sue-lin, a garment-factory worker, bought their 1,100 square-foot, three-bedroom, one-bath house last December for $158,000.
The parents of six children, they had rented the house since immigrating to the United States from Taiwan nearly eight years ago.
Ng says he initially moved his family to Lincoln Heights at the suggestion of his brother and has been happy with the choice.
“It’s very close to Chinatown,” Ng said. “And there are good schools and good markets.”
Once known as the “Pueblo’s Bedroom,” Lincoln Heights--one of the first suburbs in the city--is rich in early Los Angeles history.
The community got its start during the first Southern California building boom of the late 1800s. It quickly became a fashionable suburb for the city’s well-to-do residents. Awash in beautiful gardens, it earned the nickname “The Garden Territory” and was a favorite destination of horse-drawn surreys and buggies carrying families on Sunday outings.
Churches flourished in the area and so did the tourist industry. What was believed to be California’s only ostrich farm, built in 1906, was a must see. The birds raised there were sold to zoos worldwide and their feathers became famous adornments of the vamp gowns in the early movie days.
And then there was a large alligator farm along Mission Road with more than 20 pools--another favorite tourist stop.
The community later became home to the Selig Zoo, considered the first real zoo south of San Francisco.
Los Angeles’ first official fire station, historic No. 1, still operates on the corner of Pasadena Street and Avenue 23.
By early this century, an influx of German bread makers turned it into the bread basket of Los Angeles. Among the more notable names was Lincoln Heights resident “Mrs. Cubbison,” whose croutons are still sold today.
Following on their heels were Italian winemakers who established more than 20 wineries, most of which later moved to the San Gabriel Valley and other formerly rural, outlying areas.
The neighborhood also produced some well-known citizens, such as movie director Frank Capra.
But the glitter of Lincoln Heights faded in the early 1930s. First a strong earthquake hit Southern California and then heavy rains sent raging water down the normally dry Los Angeles River on New Year’s Eve, 1933, decimating the zoo.
And by the end of World War II, the labyrinth of freeways that traversed the area destroyed many of the city’ early landmarks and picturesque features.
Today, the North Broadway business district is made up mainly of older single-story buildings that house predominantly women’s wear shops, discount stores, gift shops and restaurants.
“We’re trying to bring in some of the businesses we don’t have here, such as a Target and perhaps another major market,” said Ramon Rodriguez, president-elect 1993 of the Lincoln Heights Chamber of Commerce.
Rodriguez said a recently formed nonprofit local development corporation is now working to revitalize the district and attract such businesses, albeit more slowly than expected, due to the recession.
But that’s fine with community activist Mary Orlando, 92, who’s been happy since moving to Lincoln Heights 70 years ago, when it was an enclave of Italian and German immigrants and a much smaller community.
“I used to know every cat and dog in Lincoln Heights, but I don’t know as many today,” she said.
Orlando raised three children in Lincoln Heights and even got her high school diploma at age 58 from Lincoln High School.
“It was just like any other little town,” she remembered. “I didn’t drive, but I had everything within walking distance.”
Orlando still lives in the same two-bedroom, one-bath house she and her husband, a railroad worker, bought decades ago for an amount she no longer remembers.
An original member of the Gray Panthers and a community activist, the great-grandmother says the convenience of her house, which she shares with her sister, is a definite plus. And even with the crime rate much higher than it was in her younger days, she plans to stay for good.
“We’re all concerned about crime, but our rate, while it isn’t that good, isn’t as bad as some of the (areas) surrounding us,” she said.
LAPD Officer David Leaton of the Hollenbeck Division said while there are gangs and graffiti problems in Lincoln Heights, gang activity--such as shootings and other crime--is “moderate” compared to other areas of Los Angeles.
And, he said, a newly implemented Neighborhood Watch foot-patrol program appears to be helping.
“The Lincoln Heights area is showing a downtrend in its crime rate,” he said. “We have some daytime burglaries, but they haven’t reached major numbers.”
Orlando said while she’s seen the community in its better days, she remains optimistic about its future.
“There’s more and more people who are homeowners,” she said. “We wanted to maintain the residential part and we’ve done pretty good. . . .”
Resident Jose Garcia, a realtor in nearby Pasadena and his wife, Lupe, a homemaker, raised nine children and put them through parochial schools in Lincoln Heights.
Garcia moved to Lincoln Heights 35 years ago from Texas. He bought what was then a two-bedroom, one-bath home for $10,500. In 1979, he remodeled, adding a bedroom and a bath. And now, the 1,400-square-foot house has been appraised for about $200,000, he said.
Garcia said the hills surrounding Lincoln Heights attracted him to the area.
“I’m very much attached to rural areas and I liked the view of the hills,” he remembered. “And now my wife really likes to live here because it’s central to our kids who can come here easily and congregate.”
Garcia said the least welcome changes are the graffiti in some portions of Lincoln Heights and the apartments, some of which don’t provide enough parking spaces for residents.
Still, he said, its locale remains ideal.
“First of all, transportation is very close, the (downtown L.A.) business district is very close, so no matter how the economy goes, it’s going to always be higher priced,” he said.
But the real estate market is of little interest to many residents, such as Sylvia Arias, who plans to spend most, if not the rest of her life in Lincoln Heights.
“I’m just used to living in the city,” Arias said. “After you’ve been here awhile, you know the good places to go to eat, the best places to buy your vegetables. Maybe when I’m old and gray, we’ll go live in the country but unless the crime rate gets out of hand, I’m happy here.”
At a Glance Population
1991 estimate: 28,374
1980-91 change: +13.5%
Median age: 27.9 years
Annual income
Per capita: 6,867
Median household: 21,028
Household distribution
Less than $10,000: 20.9%
$10,000 - $20,000: 26.6%
$20,000 - $35,000: 24.5%
$35,000 - $75,000: 24.4%
$75,000 + 03.6%
