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Studio City is an LA City neighborhood south of the 101 in the Valley, named for Republic Studios (later Mack Sennett Studios, now CBS Studio Center). Mixed residential and commercial character along Ventura Boulevard.
In the southeast San Fernando Valley, just west of the Cahuenga Pass, covering 6.31 square miles. The Ventura Boulevard corridor runs east to west through it and carries the commercial frontage; the southern edge climbs into the Santa Monica Mountains. The neighborhood is split between two Los Angeles City Council districts, the northeast in District 2 and the southwest in District 4, which occasionally matters when a local land-use question is in play.
A City of Los Angeles neighborhood, not a separate city — LA City rules, LA City taxes, LA City enforcement, and Los Angeles rent stabilization on any building whose certificate of occupancy predates 1 October 1978. The 2000 census counted 34,034 residents at 5,395 per square mile, and a 2008 estimate put the figure at 37,201. That is a moderate density by Valley standards — well below Panorama City, well above Tarzana — on land that carries a premium for its position at the Cahuenga Pass.
About 35,000 residents, professional-class demographic heavily tied to entertainment-industry employment at CBS Studio Center and nearby Burbank studios. Strong school districts support a stable family demographic.
Mid-size buildings on relatively expensive Valley land. The properties in this record run in the single digits and low teens of units, and the per-door figures on the closings page sit above the rest of the Valley submarkets published here and below the Westside ones. The tenant base is drawn from entertainment-industry employment on both sides of the Cahuenga Pass, and it is one of the few Valley submarkets where a renter can reach Hollywood and downtown without a car.
Post-war Valley apartment stock along and off the Ventura Boulevard corridor — walk-ups and courts from the 1950s through the 1970s — with single-family fabric on the hillside streets climbing south. Most of the multifamily predates 1 October 1978, so Los Angeles rent stabilization applies across the great majority of it. The neighborhood's premium comes from position rather than from architecture: it is the Valley address closest to the studios on both sides of the hill.
| Building | Year | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| CBS Studio Center | 1927 | The studio Mack Sennett founded on 20 acres, and the reason the neighborhood has its name. Still a working production facility and a substantial local employer. |
| Fire Station 78 | 1955 | In 1955 it became the first racially integrated station in the Los Angeles City Fire Department. |
No Historic Preservation Overlay Zone covers the neighborhood. The constraints that bind are the rent-stabilization ordinance and the zoning, with hillside regulations applying to the streets climbing toward Mulholland. Individual buildings can carry their own designation, so confirm any address against the city's records rather than assuming.
CBS Studio Center anchors entertainment employment. Ventura Boulevard hosts a dense commercial corridor of restaurants, retail, and professional services.
Bus service; no rail within the neighborhood. Primary access via the 101, Coldwater Canyon, Laurel Canyon, and Ventura Boulevard.
This is the distinguishing fact against every other Valley submarket in this record: the Metro B Line — the subway — serves the Universal City/Studio City station at the neighborhood's eastern end. Valley Village, Winnetka, Tarzana, Panorama City and Pacoima have no rail at all today. A renter here can reach Hollywood and downtown without a car, and that access is already built rather than scheduled or proposed, which is worth more in an underwriting model than any planned line.
LAUSD. Carpenter Avenue Elementary is a notable public school. Campbell Hall is a prominent private option.
LAUSD schools serving the area include Carpenter Community Charter School for kindergarten through grade 5 at 3909 Carpenter Avenue, Walter Reed Middle School for grades 6 to 8 at 4525 Irvine Avenue, and Rio Vista Elementary at 4243 Satsuma Avenue. There is also an unusual concentration of private schools in and around the neighborhood, among them Campbell Hall, Harvard-Westlake, Bridges Academy and Oakwood School. School catchment is a live driver of rental demand here in a way it is not in most Valley submarkets.
CBS Studio Center (aka Radford), Tujunga Wash Watershed area, Studio City Farmers Market.
Studio City Recreation Center, the Tujunga Wash Greenway (adjacent), Coldwater Canyon Park (adjacent), and the Fryman Canyon hiking trails accessible from the hillside boundary.
| Park | What is there |
|---|---|
| Wilacre Park | 128 acres in the Santa Monica Mountains on the neighborhood's southern edge. |
| Fryman Canyon Park | 122 acres of hillside parkland, a well-used hiking area. |
| Coldwater Canyon Park | Hillside parkland above the neighborhood. |
| Studio City Recreation Center | Also known as Beeman Park, the neighborhood's main flat-land public facility. |
Ventura Boulevard through Studio City is one of LA's densest restaurant corridors, with established independent restaurants, celebrity-frequented spots, and sushi destinations (Studio City has long been a hub for Japanese cuisine in the Valley).
| Institution | Since | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| CBS Studio Center | 1927 | A working studio inside the neighborhood since 1927 — the anchor employer and the source of the neighborhood's name and identity. |
Studio City Farmers Market (Sundays, one of the largest in LA). Studio City Chamber of Commerce community events.
CBS Studio Center (also called CBS Radford or formerly Republic Studios and Mack Sennett Studios) has operated continuously since 1928 and has produced some of the most significant works in American television history, including Seinfeld and many CBS primetime series.
Split between Los Angeles City Council District 2 in the northeast and District 4 in the southwest.
Named for the Mack Sennett Studios (established 1928; now CBS Radford). Developed heavily in the 1940s-60s. The Ventura Boulevard commercial core evolved through the 1970s-90s into its current dense form.
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1927 | Mack Sennett establishes a film studio on 20 acres. The area around it takes the name Studio City, and the studio survives today as CBS Studio Center. |
| 1955 | Fire Station 78 becomes the first racially integrated station in the Los Angeles City Fire Department. |
These are the 26 Los Angeles submarkets where the group has closed the most buildings, on our own record rather than a published index. The spread is the reason a citywide per-unit figure is close to useless for pricing a specific building.
| Submarket | Buildings | Units | Median per unit | Size range |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hollywood | 24 | 562 | $282,589 | 3–75 |
| Koreatown | 21 | 465 | $158,958 | 4–96 |
| West Hollywood | 21 | 206 | $354,286 | 2–22 |
| Sherman Oaks | 17 | 349 | $237,708 | 6–47 |
| Palms | 13 | 337 | $296,875 | 7–118 |
| Glendale | 12 | 224 | $258,854 | 5–92 |
| Van Nuys | 12 | 380 | $171,801 | 4–68 |
| North Hollywood | 11 | 191 | $271,429 | 5–46 |
| Santa Monica | 8 | 100 | $616,667 | 3–27 |
| Reseda | 8 | 506 | $156,639 | 10–138 |
| West Los Angeles | 6 | 62 | $575,000 | 7–16 |
| Hancock Park | 6 | 129 | $230,519 | 7–35 |
| Los Feliz | 5 | 123 | $225,000 | 6–48 |
| Panorama City | 5 | 178 | $135,849 | 22–53 |
| Fairfax | 5 | 31 | $425,000 | 3–13 |
| Burbank | 4 | 47 | $298,917 | 10–15 |
| Toluca Lake | 4 | 84 | $337,625 | 5–40 |
| Mid-City | 4 | 26 | $256,458 | 6–8 |
| Valley Village | 4 | 81 | $263,472 | 9–34 |
| Pacoima | 4 | 282 | $153,691 | 52–100 |
| Silverlake | 3 | 38 | $243,333 | 10–16 |
| Venice | 3 | 30 | $425,000 | 3–17 |
| Mar Vista | 3 | 21 | $354,167 | 5–10 |
| Studio City | 3 | 51 | $322,857 | 5–39 |
| Tarzana | 3 | 266 | $229,661 | 30–118 |
| Winnetka | 3 | 90 | $250,000 | 12–52 |
The place facts on this page — founding dates, acreages, opening years, boundaries — were checked against these sources on 2026-09-09. The closing figures are computed from the group’s own transaction archive. Where two sources disagreed on a number, the claim is stated only to the level both support.
In the southeast San Fernando Valley, just west of the Cahuenga Pass, covering 6.31 square miles. The Ventura Boulevard corridor runs east to west through it and carries the commercial frontage; the southern edge climbs into the Santa Monica Mountains. The neighborhood is split between two Los Angeles City Council districts, the northeast in District 2 and the southwest in District 4, which occasionally matters when a local land-use question is in play.
A City of Los Angeles neighborhood, not a separate city — LA City rules, LA City taxes, LA City enforcement, and Los Angeles rent stabilization on any building whose certificate of occupancy predates 1 October 1978. The 2000 census counted 34,034 residents at 5,395 per square mile, and a 2008 estimate put the figure at 37,201.
Post-war Valley apartment stock along and off the Ventura Boulevard corridor — walk-ups and courts from the 1950s through the 1970s — with single-family fabric on the hillside streets climbing south. Most of the multifamily predates 1 October 1978, so Los Angeles rent stabilization applies across the great majority of it. The neighborhood's premium comes from position rather than from architecture: it is the Valley address closest to the studios on both sides of the hill.
No Historic Preservation Overlay Zone covers the neighborhood. The constraints that bind are the rent-stabilization ordinance and the zoning, with hillside regulations applying to the streets climbing toward Mulholland.
Studio City is two investment markets separated by Ventura Boulevard — south of Ventura is hillside residential with pre-1978 RSO exposure, north is more commercial-adjacent with newer inventory. Pricing strategy depends on which side the building sits.
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