Beverly Hills, California

Few neighborhoods denote the kind of wealth and elegance that Beverly Hills does. Even now that other neighborhoods have staked their claims to being even more affluent than Beverly Hills, it is still Beverly Hills that gets mentioned when people are reaching for a city that denotes elegance—as in a recent review I read where someone wrote, “the Beverly Hill of San Francisco.” You know you have mastered a particular category when you are being used to symbolize that abstract notion.

These days, Beverly Hills has fallen slightly behind Bel-Air and Brentwood in terms of total wealth. The fabulously wealthy now seem to prefer hillside mansions to the flat, leafy streets and smaller manors that make up much of Beverly Hills. This does not, of course, mean that Beverly Hills is slum; it is hardly that. Home prices are still astronomical and there is still a very palpable cache to living in this historic neighborhood. The homes are pristine and well-kept and the tour buses are only slightly annoying.

Beverly Hills is also a very safe place to live. There is virtually no gang activity and though there have been four murders in the area in the past four years, a closer look at the details makes you realize that all of these were more the result of domestic entanglements than gang violence or property crime gone wrong. The victims also give you a sense of the current residents of the area. One was the brother of a famous actor, one the son of not so well known-director and a third had investments in the adult entertainment industry. Put another way, many of the residents of Beverly Hills are not the top flight actors that once populated the area, but those close to or involved with aspects of the entertainment industry.

A further look at demographics also shows that though 4 out of 5 residents are white, 2 out of 5 are foreign born, with Iranians and Russians being the major countries of origin. Although the population is not as wealthy as that found in Brentwood and Bel-Air, the average household still makes $90K which is nothing to sneeze at.

Furthermore, the Beverly Hills area has excellent private and public schools. Beverly Hills High is top notch and the area is also home to Harvard-Westlake, perhaps LA’s best known and most well-regarded prep school. I had friends who attended Harvard-Westlake and they all went on to prestigious colleges and successful careers.

There are sections of Beverly Hills that have apartments (right off of Santa Monica Boulevard, for example) and that are somewhat affordable, and it is possible for upper-middle class families to live in the area. With Rodeo Drive nearby and the Wilshire Mall, there is certainly no lack of places for someone to spend their money and starlets and trophy wives abound in the area.

Put simply, Beverly Hills is still a place where people go to see and be seen, even if it is now far more accessible to the middle class than it once was.