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A California home’s yard is 31% below average size. Where are the biggest lots?

“How expensive?” tracks measurements of California’s totally unaffordable housing market.

The pain: The typical California homeowner lives on one-third less land than the average American.

The source: My trusty spreadsheet reviewed a ranking of US cities and the average size of the land surrounding their homes by LawnStarter. The study of 2,000 municipalities included 301 in California.

The pinch

California cities had average yardage ranging from Fallbrook’s sprawling 37,157 square feet to San Francisco’s 784. Lots in the 301 Golden State towns had 6,900 square feet, according to my population-weighted average.

Contrast that with the 1,699 cities outside the Golden State. Average yardage ranged from Carney, Maryland’s 49,658 square feet to Boston’s 871. Non-California owners averaged 10,000-square-foot lots.

That’s a 31% difference!

Or look at it this way: Just 55 of the 301 California cities offer typical lots larger than the out-of-state average.

Pressure points

Other tiny-yard California towns are primarily big-city suburbs …

Richmond at 3,267 square feet

Alameda at 3,223

Irvine at 3,180

Rancho Santa Margarita at 2,962

Seal Beach at 2,919

Manhattan Beach at 2,526

Daly City at 2,396

Aliso Viejo at 2,309

Newport Beach at 2,265

And, other big-lot cities in California are located further from major job hubs …

Apple Valley at 24,132

Atascadero at 22,869

Norco at 22,651

Hesperia at 21,606

Madera at 21,519

Los Gatos at 20,430

Lafayette at 18,861

Poway at 18,731

Escondido at 18,339

One plus

Let me offer up a Golden State advantage – bigger lots in the biggest cities …

The 10 most populated cities in California had a population-weighted average yard size of 5,300 square feet. Those cities include …

Los Angeles at 5,314 square feet

San Diego at 5,706

San Jose at 4,443

San Francisco at 784

Fresno at 8,494

Sacramento at 8,320

Long Beach at 4,356

Oakland at 3,833

Bakersfield at 8,364

Anaheim at 6,142

In the 49 other states, the 10 biggest cities averaged 4,200 square-foot lots …

New York at 958 square feet

Chicago at 2,047

Houston at 6,360

Phoenix at 6,970

Philadelphia at 828

San Antonio at 10,019

Dallas at 7,884

Austin at 10,498

Jacksonville at 12,284

Fort Worth at 8,015

Jonathan Lansner is the business columnist for the Southern California News Group. He can be reached at jlansner@scng.com


Source: Orange County Register


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