The median home price for Manhattan Beach in 2022 was $3.137M. (See our post about that with graphs, charts and comment here.)
You may be asking yourself, who pays an odd number like $3.137M for a house?
No one, it turns out. One party paid $3.125M, and another $3.149M.
Because the median is the "middle" point at which half the homes sold higher, and half sold lower, $3.137M is actually a calculation.
And that means if you want to learn from actual houses what people could get for the money last year, we have not one, but two "median homes" to show you.
Onward we go.
We'll start at the top with 732 36th.
This is a Tree Section remodel with 4br/3ba and nearly 2550 sqft. of interior space.
The street-to-alley lot makes for an attractive entry. The front is actually hidden more or less behind mature (and well manicured) shrubbery.
Downstairs living spaces are pretty open, front-to-back, with a somewhat modest front family room as the main common space. (A dining room uses about half the space up front by the entry.)
The kitchen runs long toward the back of the house, with a slick remodel that gives the proverbial "center of the home" a ton of love.
Downstairs, there's also a bedroom and remodeled bath, breakfast area and large walk-in pantry.
Upstairs are 2 bedrooms, including the primary, plus laundry. The baths, especially the primary, are very well done and both warm and interesting in design. The 4th bedroom is actually in a separate unit over the garage.
The other standout feature here was the elegantly redone backyard, with covered spaces, attractive furniture, wet bar, a built-in outdoor TV, and more. If they built this before COVID first hit, they were sure glad they did; otherwise, we may have been looking at one of the best "emergency" backyard renos in a long time. Superb.
For all that, the buyers paid $3.149M, closing in mid-January 2022.
(732 36th was listed by Vincent Dorn, eXp Realty of California.)
To recap, one of the "median homes" for the year was a bit undersized (anything less than 3000 sqft. in the Trees would be considered so), with one of its bedrooms above the garage, in a very far northern location just one street in from Rosecrans.
It hit these $3.1M+ heights because it was so livable and aesthetically pleasing. It's just less overall than what you might say the typical Tree Section suburban-home buyer is usually seeking.
To see the other "median home" of 2022, we need to go east of the highway.
It's 1505 Gates (5br/4ba, 4026 sqft.).
As might be detectable in this image, the home is a late-90s build, roughly Spanish in style.
The home had done some service in recent years as a furnished rental, but by a certain point in late 2021, it was time to sell.
On those big Costa area lots, they built big, and this one was no exception. The home features a sprawling layout, with high ceilings up front, and several discrete spaces downstairs. The owners had even enclosed part of the yard as a Florida-style sunroom, and there was still yard left.
Very little throughout the home had been updated from its 90s condition, so that, for instance, the kitchen featured ample dark granite and light wood cabinetry.
Upstairs, the voluminous primary suite featured a bath with travertine tile, dressing area and extra closet space. The other beds and baths were largely original, but clean.
The home was first listed for sale around Thanksgiving 2021, and made its deal in early January 2022, closing in March.
Buyers paid $3.125M, $105K off the asking price.
(1505 Gates was listed by Robert Reyes, Palm Realty Boutique, Inc.)
So the second "median home" of the year was a big East Manhattan Spanish that most buyers would be looking to update cosmetically... meaning, more expenses to come.
And yet as the year rolled on, this $3.1-ish purchase looked like a steal.
Two other large 90s homes on the same street, both also wanting a wide range of updates and TLC, sold for much more within months:
1550 Gates (5br/5ba, 4336 sqft.) at $3.625M in June 2022.
(Listed by John Hunter, The Real Estate Hunter, Inc.)
and
1756 Gates (5br/5ba, 4342 sqft.) at $3.535M in May 2022.
(Listed by Rodman Amiri, Merit Real Estate.)
Neither of those were "median homes." They were just expensive fixers, er, blank slates.
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More Resources
See all Tree Section sales of the past 12 months
See all East Manhattan SFR sales of the past 12 months
Please see our blog disclaimer.
Listings presented above are supplied via the MLS and are brokered by a variety of agents and firms, not Dave Fratello or Edge Real Estate Agency, unless so stated with the listing. Images and links to properties above lead to a full MLS display of information, including home details, lot size, all photos, and listing broker and agent information and contact information.
