@nytimes The Portuguese Bend neighborhood in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, rests on an active landslide. In 2024, land on the Palos Verdes Peninsula was shifting as much as a foot per week in some places. The threat that homes will crack or collapse looms large, and some residents are without electrical service. Many have fled their homes for safer ground. But a few new homebuyers are choosing to take a risk and purchase anyway, seeing a rare opportunity to own a piece of Southern California coastal property. Video by Mimi Dwyer, Jeremy Raff, Yasu Tsuji and Nicholas Kraus #California #landslide #realestatetok ♬ original sound - The New York Times
March 15, 2026
"Part of the silver lining is that we have a much better view now."
Life on a landslide:
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62 comments:
Insurance companies should pull out of California.
I don't have a lot sympathy for someone who bought a house there knowing it would eventually collapse from the sliding land.
"I don't have a lot sympathy for someone who bought a house there knowing it would eventually collapse from the sliding land."
It's like the way people keep buying beachfront property when the oceans are rising. They're just hoping one or more of these things are true:
1. It's not really happening.
2. It's going to happen pretty slowly.
3. We'll enjoy it while it lasts.
4. We got a discount.
"Insurance companies should pull out of California."
This property is not covered by insurance and hasn't been for a very long time. These owners know they have a problem and have chosen to enjoy the view while it lasts.
It's a beautiful area. I've spent a lot of time there. Often just taking a car or bike ride through, stop for a burger and beer, and look out at the ocean and Catalina Island. The road is pretty wild - it just undulates and changes from visit to visit.
Was a resident of Palos Verdes in the late 70s (near the top, on Madeline Cove in Rancho PV and Via Pacheco in Lunada Bay area of PVE). Portuguese Bend was well known to be "on the move" way back when.
Lots of reasons to pay more to live there; even in "bagain" areas like PB.
Besides being an island of green and tranquility, PV had the best public schools in the state of CA (along with bottom-level per-pupil spending). FWIW, PV is also home to one of Trump's golf courses. Nice.
5. We'll be able to stick someone else with the bill.
Many of the homes threatened are big and beautiful with amazing views - geologically, just sand castles on the beach.
In the travelogue “Roughing It” by Twain he tells about a guy who had a house on a hillside that slid down into the valley to someone else’s farm. The guy said he liked it better in the valley and since his house was on the original soil he owned, he intended to stay. In the resultant court case the Washington appointed territorial judge ruled that if God had decided that the land owner should relocate he would not rule against the Devine, and let him stay. Lack of a property tax probably simplified the issue.
The kind of people who want government jobs are not the kind of people you want running the place.
I'm reminded of Dad's cousin who lived in a house straddling the San Andreas fault. He shared the house with his ex-wife because they couldn't sell.
$1.3 million, and that was considered "half-price" ?? For that? That is absolutely insane.
Apts in Pacifica Ca. bordering beach slid of short hill during a wet winter. Remaining were demolished for safety.
With those gone, apts across the street were rewarded with a clear ocean view. Often wondered if rent went up immediately for those apts with a view.
"$1.3 million, and that was considered "half-price" ?? For that? That is absolutely insane."
Ironically, both the inflated price and the discount are due to the location.
"Best schools"??? Daughter watched a movie nearly every day in chemistry class. And that was before pronouns and trans took over. Schools in CA have been a disaster for decades.
Landslips are common where there is mountain building in progress, as it is in California. When I lived in the Caribbean, similar thing. I became an expert on earthquakes, having been through so many of them. You commonly see roads built by the SeaBees in WWII, and they have more recent abrupt kinks in them - like a 2-3 ft rise on an active fault, that's been ramped and paved over. Or homes, like these, that head down a hill - one week they're near the road, a couple months later, they're a few hundred feet away and halfway down the hill.
Gotta be hard to live with, my sympathies and all, but should the taxpayer foot the bill?
"The road is pretty wild - it just undulates and changes from visit to visit."
And bagoh wins the thread.
In the long run we're all dead. What with the constant fretting and anxiety, she'll probably die before her time, maybe even before her house rolls down the hill. So that's another silver lining in addition to the ocean view. Win-win all the way down.
“ Ironically, both the inflated price and the discount are due to the location.”
Yes, landslides are the cause of, and the solution to, all housing price concerns.
"landslides are the cause of, and the solution to, all housing price concerns."
You might have just found Schrödinger's cat.
I think there's a reward?
If there’s a landslide do you still own the land that slid?
What a shock - it is California!
"Do you know that according to Aristotle a person who dies crushed by a column does not die a tragic death? And yet here is that nontragic death hanging over you." Sollers, Numbers
Not only can you not get insurance in PB, but you can't get a mortgage. Lenders don't lend without insurance protection. These people pay cash for these houses. I lived in the Southbay area of LA for 75 years, most of it in Hawthorne. PB has been moving for as long as I can remember. A good chunk of it has already slid down the cliff and into the ocean. It goes in spurts. The first time after houses were built there was a shock, but has now become just another day in PB. I lived for a while just south/east of PB in an area called Shore Acres. Wonderful views.
(From grok): Yes, you legally retain ownership and you may reclaim displaced land (often within time limits like 2 years), but practically, reclamation is often limited by high costs, environmental regulations, disputes, and physical infeasibility.
Many years ago we had friends move out of the SE Michigan area for a job reassignment in California. About 5 years afterwards we heard their home was caught in one of these landslides - not a complete loss but pretty-much unsellable after the event.
Pah, more climate change BS. I just listened to Ian Pilmer, a geologist. There's a lot of "denialism" in his community.
"Oceans are dangerously rising" is equivalent to "Polar bears are going extinct", in the sense that both are lies.
"It's like the way people keep buying beachfront property when the oceans are rising."
I'll take Door #2, Monty.
It took a while for someone to cry “climate change!” But I’m sure nobody doubted it would happen.
"Part of the silver lining is that we have a much better view now." -- New IRGC Commander
Life on a landslide: From the newly-formed river to the ever-closer sea!
Relative Sea level has been lowering continuously along the West Coast, from Baja to Vancouver Island since the retreat of the Continental Ice Sheet thousands of years ago. Since the arrival of European settlers, this has been documented in tidal gauge records.
When what you want trumps what you need. I want that view, but I need a stable house. What is "stability", anyways, when you can say and do anything from practically anywhere these days.
I take it this is the area that is not fire prone?
Fire is never mentioned.
Your house is sliding into the sea, but it catches fire on the way down.
Daughter watched a movie nearly every day in chemistry class
Maybe it was a pretty good movie :-) My son's first chem class was at PV High, in PVE. Later in life he headed the Chem Dept. before becoming Head Master at a top private K-!2 in LA.
I need to go back to posting class! Re. the above, my child is not a tranny (the daughter in first year chem who became a he as a teacher/administrator). A "he" all the way. It's all good :-)
Now I'm tapped in italics AAaaarrgh!!!!!
You folks have no idea how much this italics stuff entertains me. Why not just use quotation marks? no. Must use italics. lolol
"2. It's going to happen pretty slowly."
It IS happening slowly. Sea level has been rising slowly for a long time and the rate has not accelerated in recent times.
Also relevant; human lifespans are short.
Italics OFF!
Actually, isn’t this blog a bit like one of those homes in Rancho Palos Verdes? It feels stable enough - it’s been here for as long as many of those houses - yet at any moment, Google could wipe out the platform entirely. Every so often, we sense that underlying instability, but as long as it’s still here, it feels like firm ground.
Trump probably hates italics.
If you don't like the view just wait a week.
As I started to say before the italics took over. Before the fires could start, a crime wave, out of nowhere, hit the area due to the property devaluation. In California there is a progression to disasters.
Eva Marie said...Why not just use quotation marks? no. Must use italics. lolol
Quotation marks can do a few different things; italics are the best way to highlight that you are quoting someone on this blog.
that was an attempt at humor. The italics are great . . . when they work and when they don’t, they’re funny.
Adam Corolla does videos about the slow (one house) reconstruction of the burned up Malibu coast. They used to build on wood pilings on the beach, but now the state requires half million dollar concrete sea walls & 30' deep pilings. I wonder how deep PV would need to drill to try pinning the top layer. The vibrations of drilling might make things worse.
That Rancho Palos Verdes neighborhood has a really, really stupid backstory. A solid 70 years ago the developers wanted a new road. So, they cut the toe off an unstable hillside that had underground water. You NEVER cut the toe off an unstable hillside, for that's the only thing keeping the hill from going down.
https://apnews.com/article/california-los-angeles-landslides-314954b02cef5d602c93af4857865e6b
This was nothing unique in old-time California. They built on unstable hills, they built on unprotected beaches. They built without adequate water supplies. They cut tunnels through the giant trees so cars could go through.
All sorts of luxury coastal areas deal with landslides every season, and some places (e.g., Santa Cruz) put in a bunch of giant boulders because their cliff face keeps moving back (naturally/no human involvement).
So they just stopped allowing people to build new houses last summer?
While they are busy asking the state & feds for more $$$..
Californians are idiots. This story proves it.
Joan Didion lived there in the 60s. With all the problems she was having, the last thing she would have needed was her house falling into the ocean. She might have been able to get a great book out of it though.
"Italics OFF"
All hail Kevin, First of His Name, Breaker of Italics, Closer of Tags, Unitalicizer of the Doomed, Restorer of Plain Text, and True Warden of Readability.
Lem Vibe Bandit said...
I take it this is the area that is not fire prone?
Fire is never mentioned.
Your house is sliding into the sea, but it catches fire on the way down.
3/15/26, 4:18 PM
...
fire around the LA area is generally predictable. Generally there is a fire inland, the air currents carry embers to malibu, and malibu burns. There are a few areas that reliably burn. If you are not in those areas - and homeless and illegals are not starting fires - you don't suffer.
OTOH the more recent fires are thought to have been started by homeless and illegals which throws off the calculus.
PV I don't recall has had serious fires.
Also PV schools are supposed to be outstanding. LA Unified is the opposite. Universally terrible if you are not in a magnet.
Lem Vibe Bandit said...
As I started to say before the italics took over. Before the fires could start, a crime wave, out of nowhere, hit the area due to the property devaluation. In California there is a progression to disasters.
3/15/26, 5:34 PM
...
Actually it IS a known progression! Underbrush grows in the spring creating massive fuel reservoirs. The winds dry them out over the summer. Winds continue late fall/early winter and a spark starts the fires. Massive fires every year. EVERY year. Sometimes they make the news sometimes not. All the underbrush burns away. Rains come in the winter. There is no longer underbrush to hold back the rain, so we get mudslides. Homes slide down the mountains. Every few years it makes the news, eg multimillion dollar homes sliding down mountains. Then the spring comes and the underbrush starts to grow again.
It has been going on for millennia.
My recollection is the Marina in San Francisco is build on a landfill so there is no resistance to vibration. When a big meaningful earthquake comes the whole area is demolished.
PV in contrast IIRC is built on rock and there is no significant earthquake risk.
There are plenty of cities in LA where $1.2 million would buy a very nice home. I live south of LA in Orange County, that featured couple could have had their choice in 60 zip codes.
I am surprised that an insurance company would provide any coverage for that portion of Rancho Palos Verde. Also, I don't think the rest of us should be financially backstopping anyone that chose to live there, it's been a well-known calamity waiting to happen for decades.
All hail Kevin, First of His Name, Breaker of Italics, Closer of Tags, Unitalicizer of the Doomed, Restorer of Plain Text, and True Warden of Readability.
LOL and thanks so much! I, of course, read this imagining appropriate fanfare playing in the background.
If you want to poke around on Google Earth here is the URL or just go to Google Earth and ask for Portugese Bend. Parts of it look like a very upscale neighborhood. Parts of it look like the surface of the moon. I think I can see abandoned neighborhood streets and driveways.
https://earth.google.com/web/search/Portuguese+Bend,+Rancho+Palos+Verdes,+CA/@33.73855325,-118.36255135,20.84221388a,629.74960565d,35y,-30.36729069h,38.48333363t,0r/data=CiwiJgokCVBZzFJeUjlAEU5ZzFJeUjnAGTTOJ_57DEtAITTOJ_57DEvAQgIIAToDCgEwQgIIAEoNCP___________wEQAA
"and homeless and illegals are not starting fires…"
There's always a catch.
Jim - 1- I don’t believe any of those houses have insurance.
2- At best $1.2 million anywhere drivable anywhere around Los Angeles at best might get you a small one or two bedroom apartment with no land. You can probably spend that much in maybe some small city away from the major cities but 1.2 million unfortunately really does not get you very much near any moderate size city in California.
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