A Pocketful of Charm

In the close-knit community of Santa Ana’s Wilshire Square, it’s not uncommon for Marc LaFont to invite neighbors to dinner. The only trouble is, they’re always late.

“When they’re walking to my house for dinner, guests get stopped by other neighbors who want to chat, and they inevitably arrive a half an hour late,” said LaFont, a publicist who has lived in Wilshire Square for 19 years.

LaFont moved there right out of college in 1978, buying his two-bedroom, 1 1/2-bath home with a library for $78,000.

“Although a Realtor urged me to look at newer housing, I refused,” LaFont said. “I didn’t want a new condominium or tract home. I wanted a house with character that gave me the freedom to express myself. There’s a feeling of funkiness and history in an older home that you can’t find in newer houses.”

LaFont found such a home in Wilshire Square, a neighborhood of more than 600 homes that were built between 1910 and the early 1950s.

Situated south of downtown Santa Ana, Wilshire Square is bounded by McFadden Avenue on the north, Main Street on the east, Flower Street on the west and Edinger Avenue on the south.

Charming older homes, friendly neighbors and good prices attract residents to Wilshire Square and keep them there, said Realtor Irma Jauregui of Hacienda Realty in Santa Ana.

Most mornings on the well-maintained tree-lined streets of Wilshire Square, you’ll find residents walking together and visiting one another for coffee and breakfast, said Jauregui, who has lived in Wilshire Square since 1990.

“Many of the residents are self-employed and work at home, so it’s customary to visit one another in the morning,” she said. Some residents, like LaFont, have even built gates in their fences so that they can visit their neighbors more quickly.

The average home in Wilshire Square costs $150,000 for a three-bedroom, one-bath 1,200- to 1,300-square-foot house. On the low end there are two-bedroom, one-bath homes of 900 to 1,000 square feet for $130,000, and on the high end you’ll find three-bedroom, two-bath homes of more than 1,500 square feet for $165,000 to $170,000.

The heart of Wilshire Square is the homeowners association, which is made up of a group of dedicated residents. Unlike many associations that mandate rules and regulations, Wilshire Square’s group was created to ensure that the neighborhood retains its history and charm, said LaFont, who has served on the association’s board over the years.

Residents originally banded together to make sure that the city of Santa Ana would not remove any of the large, established trees on the streets, or tear down houses and replace them with apartment buildings, LaFont said.

Today, although the association does address minor problems such as traffic flow and dim street lighting, it mostly oversees the neighborhood’s many social events, including an annual home tour, block parties and even its first arts festival, which was held last summer. The association also produces a bimonthly newsletter, and members have monthly neighborhood meetings. They also have a gardening club.

Although the neighborhood is close-knit and many residents have lived there for years, they are open to newcomers, as Jeraldine and Mark Moralls discovered when they went house hunting a year ago.

“As we stood in the frontyard of the first home we looked at in Wilshire Square, the next-door neighbor came out of his house and welcomed us to the neighborhood,” said Jeraldine Moralls, a visual merchandiser for Macy’s in Santa Ana. “Although we told him we were just looking, by the end of the day, we had bought the house.”

The night the Morallses drove up to move in, neighbors came over with wine and food and helped them cart in furniture.

“Moving into Wilshire Square has been like a dream,” said Moralls, who, with her husband, a Web page designer, bought a three-bedroom, 1 1/2-bath 1,600-square-foot house with a detached two-car garage, art studio and a small shop, for $143,000 in March 1996.

“The house is unique and was a great bargain, and we have never lived in an area where the people are so genuine and friendly,” she said. “The first weekend we were here, the next-door neighbor invited us to brunch. We met so many nice families we had to make a schematic map of the neighborhood so we could remember everyone’s names.”

Not only do residents of Wilshire Square enjoy the friendliness of the neighborhood, they also appreciate the security of living in a close-knit community.

“My neighbors look out for me,” said resident Ellen Sumrall Brief. “My alarm went off recently, and three neighbors called the police immediately.”

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Like many residents of the community, Brief thinks that Santa Ana has gotten a bad rap with its reputation as a gang center.

“We feel very safe here in Wilshire Square,” she said. “We don’t have graffiti, and the crime rate isn’t high. The police seem to be on top of things. For a while residents were worried about being encircled by gang activity and that the neighborhood would go downhill, but those things haven’t come to pass.”

Brief, an interior designer, and her husband, Michael, an entrepreneur, bought their house in 1978 for $57,000. It was originally 1,400 square feet with three bedrooms and one bath. The couple remodeled and added another story in 1984, which made the house 2,400 square feet with three bathrooms, four bedrooms and a loft that she uses as an office and studio. Ten years ago they remodeled the kitchen to make it look like it would have 70 years ago, when the house was built.

As a designer, Brief enjoys the unique houses found in Wilshire Square and the freedom owners have to decorate and remodel them.

“No one tells us what color to paint our house here,” she said. “This is a good area for people who like unique, vintage housing, rather than tract homes. These homes are one of a kind, and they attract adventurous homeowners with an eye to something special.”

Just about all of the homes in Wilshire Square are custom-built, said 25-year resident Chuck Wright, a Santa Ana schoolteacher who was the area’s unofficial historian for a number of years.

“Parcels of land were owned by various individuals who originally had them filled with walnut and orange trees,” Wright said. “Some of the houses were built after World War II by war veterans who incorporated styles found in France, Spain and England. The result is an eclectic mix of architectural styles, such as English Tudor cottage style, Spanish Colonial, Mediterranean and Craftsman bungalow.”

Those developing the area also added some features that were considered novel concepts at the time, including street lights, sidewalk curbs and trees.

When college art teacher and artist Deborah Davidson went looking for a home in August 1996, she was drawn to Wilshire Square and a 1923 Craftsman-style home.

“I really like the Craftsman style and the fact that the home is in its original condition,” said Davidson, who bought a 1,400-square-foot three-bedroom, two-bath home with a separate garage and studio that total an additional 450 square feet for $160,000.

The studio is a separate building that she completed when she moved in, with skylights and a bay window.

“A lot of the older homes I looked at had been remodeled and updated,” she said. “My house still has the styles that were popular when the house was built, and I find that very refreshing.”

Since moving into Wilshire Square, Davidson has also discovered that she enjoys the type of people who live there. “Many artists and other creative people live here,” she said. “There’s a sense of community here that I haven’t found anywhere else.”