Traditional homes in Los Angeles

What makes a house "traditional"

In Los Angeles listings, "traditional" means houses that look to early America and England. The heart of it is American Colonial Revival. The signatures: a symmetrical front with the door in the middle, multi-pane double-hung windows, wood shutters, a hipped or side-gabled roof, and walls of clapboard or brick. The entry gets the attention, with a pediment, columns or pilasters, a paneled door, and sometimes sidelights or a fanlight.

You'll see a few versions of it here:

• Georgian Revival is the formal one. It's usually two stories, often brick, with a symmetrical front five windows wide, a pedimented entry and sometimes Palladian windows.
• Cape Cod is the compact one: one or one and a half stories under a steep side-gabled roof, often with dormers, shutters and a center door.
• American Traditional is the agent term for the simpler versions built from about 1940 on. The city's historic survey calls them Late American Colonial Revival: side-gabled roofs, clapboard or brick, fixed shutters and a stylized door surround that suggests the colonial details instead of copying them.

How LA got them

The Colonial Revival took off nationally after the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia and the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago, and reached Los Angeles in the early 1900s. The city's own historic context statement notes it never spread here like Spanish Colonial Revival, but it lasted, with simplified versions going up across the San Fernando Valley after World War II.

A handful of architects set the standard:

• Paul R. Williams designed almost 2,000 homes in Los Angeles, according to the LA Conservancy, in styles from Tudor and Regency to Spanish and modern. The city survey calls his 1936 Georgian Revival estate in Bel Air one of his most celebrated designs, and he did Colonial and Georgian houses in Hancock Park and Santa Monica too.
• Roland Coate ran his own Los Angeles office from the mid-1920s until 1958. Best known for Monterey Colonial Revival, he also designed Colonial Revival and ranch houses, and the city survey names him with Williams behind the large Colonial Revival houses of Bel Air.
• Gerard Colcord opened his practice here in 1924 and designed more than 300 houses, steering clear of modernism. He worked in Tudor and Colonial Revival in Pacific Palisades, Hancock Park, Bel Air and Brentwood, and after the war Colonial Revival became one of his signatures: louvered shutters, wood and brick siding, dormers, porches on simple columns.

Where to find them

• Hancock Park. Hancock Park mixes Georgian and Colonial Revival houses with its Tudor and Spanish homes, on wide, flat streets laid out in the 1920s.
• Brentwood and Bel Air. Brentwood Park, north of San Vicente, has traditional estates and Colonial and Cape Cod style homes on large lots. Bel Air holds many of the big Colonial Revival houses by Williams, Coate and Colcord.
• Santa Monica. North of Montana has 1920s to 1950s traditional and Cape Cod style houses among its Spanish homes and new builds, including La Mesa Drive and its canopy of Moreton Bay figs.
• Cheviot Hills. Frans Nelson & Sons opened Cheviot Hills in 1923, and its curving streets fill with Traditional, Colonial Revival, Spanish and English style homes from the 1920s through the 1940s.
• Toluca Lake. Toluca Lake has 1930s to 1950s Colonial Revival houses on wide, tree-lined streets, including a 1934 Southern Colonial house on Toluca Lake Avenue by Paul R. Williams.
• The Valley flats. The city survey lists Sherman Oaks and Encino among the postwar neighborhoods where Late Colonial Revival is most common.

For a lower, one-story cousin with the same shutters, see California ranch homes.

Buying one: what to look for

Original, expanded or rebuilt. Many traditional houses have had second stories added, garages converted or the whole front redone as a modern farmhouse. Look for original wood double-hung windows, shutters that match the window size, the door surround and the chimney. Ask which parts are original, and ask for the permits on every addition. In the City of LA, permit records are on file with LADBS, the building department.

Inspection points specific to the style:

• Plumbing. Houses from the 1920s through the 1950s may still have galvanized steel water lines and cast iron drains, which corrode with age. Clay sewer lines can crack or let roots in, so a sewer camera inspection is a good idea.
• Electrical. The oldest houses may still have some knob-and-tube wiring, which can affect insurance and usually needs updating.
• Wood siding and windows. Clapboard and wood sills need paint to keep water out. Inspectors look for rot and termite damage at sills and trim.
• Foundations and chimneys. Many older houses sit on raised foundations over a crawlspace. Ask whether the house has been bolted to its foundation and whether the cripple walls have been braced, and have masonry chimneys checked.
• Roofs. Dormers and valleys add flashing where leaks start. Ask the roof's age and check the attic for stains.

Preservation and size rules. Hancock Park is a Historic Preservation Overlay Zone (HPOZ), where exterior work generally goes through design review, and individual houses anywhere in the city can be designated Historic-Cultural Monuments. City Planning lists the city's historic districts. Outside those areas, City of LA single-family lots fall under the Baseline Mansionization Ordinance, which caps how much floor area a house can have, so check it before you plan a second story. Santa Monica and other cities run their own rules.

The Mills Act. Owners of some qualifying historic homes may be able to enter a Mills Act contract with their city, which can lower property taxes in exchange for a commitment to restore and maintain the house. Eligibility, application windows and limits vary, so this is general information only. Start with the City of LA's preservation incentives page and verify the details with the city and a tax professional.