Lawndale Homes for Sale

Lawndale is a small incorporated city in the middle of the South Bay, a little under two square miles, sitting east of Redondo Beach and south of Hawthorne. It is one of the few places in this part of Los Angeles County where a buyer can still find a detached house on its own lot without a beach-city price attached.

Where is Lawndale?

Lawndale covers roughly 1.97 square miles between Hawthorne to the north and Redondo Beach to the west and south, with Torrance and unincorporated County territory nearby.

It is inland rather than coastal, and that is the whole trade. You are a short drive from the sand at Redondo and Manhattan, close to the aerospace and technology employers along the Rosecrans corridor and around LAX, and paying considerably less per square foot than any of the cities you are driving to. For a lot of buyers that is the entire argument.

In CRMLS it splits into two areas, 112 North Lawndale and 113 South Lawndale. Work at area level when pulling comparable sales rather than treating the city as one market.

Who governs Lawndale?

Lawndale is its own incorporated city, established on December 28, 1959 with an original area of about 1.897 square miles.

That matters more than it sounds. Planning, permits, code enforcement and city services all run through the City of Lawndale, not through Los Angeles County and not through a neighboring city. If you are comparing Lawndale to an unincorporated pocket nearby, you are comparing two different systems.

Which schools serve Lawndale?

Two districts, and this is the single most important thing for a buyer here to understand. Lawndale does not have one unified district.

Kindergarten through eighth grade is the Lawndale Elementary School District, which also serves parts of Hawthorne and some unincorporated County territory including Alondra Park. Its schools are William Anderson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, William Green, Billy Mitchell, Lucille Smith and Mark Twain elementary schools, plus Jane Addams and Will Rogers middle schools, and an Early Childhood Education program covering preschool, Early Start, LEAP and transitional kindergarten.

High school is the Centinela Valley Union High School District, a separate district established in 1905 serving grades nine through twelve. It operates Lawndale High School, Leuzinger High School and Hawthorne High School, along with R.K. Lloyde Continuation High School and the Centinela Valley Independent Study School. Centinela Valley draws from three feeder elementary districts: Lawndale, Hawthorne and Lennox.

If that structure sounds familiar, it is the same shape as Hermosa Beach, where a K-8 district feeds a separate high school district. It is common in this part of the county and it catches people out, because a single district name on a listing tells you nothing about the high school.

One thing worth knowing anywhere: an address is a strong indicator of school assignment, not a guarantee. Districts finalize elementary placement through the enrollment process, and where a school of residence is impacted a student may be placed at the nearest school with space. That is normal, it is manageable, and it is far easier to plan around in March than in August.

Attendance areas are set by the districts and they change. Verify with the district rather than a listing, a map pin, or this page.

What kind of homes are in Lawndale?

The housing stock is predominantly post-war single-family homes on modest lots, with a substantial share of multi-family property and townhomes mixed through the city.

Most of it went up in the decades either side of incorporation, which means original condition varies enormously from one block to the next depending on what has been done since. Permit history is worth pulling here more than in a newer market, because additions and conversions are common and not all of them were permitted.

Lot sizes are small but usable, and detached homes with their own yards are still the norm rather than the exception. That combination, a detached house on its own lot within a short drive of the beach cities, is increasingly rare in the South Bay at this price point.

What should buyers verify in Lawndale?

Three things, all parcel-specific and all answerable inside a normal contingency period.

Which school districts apply. Confirm both the K-8 district and the high school district for the specific address rather than assuming from the city name.

Permit history. Additions, garage conversions and second units are common in this housing stock. Confirm what was permitted and when, with the City of Lawndale.

Zoning and use. Lawndale mixes single-family and multi-family zoning closely together, so check what the parcel actually permits, particularly if you are considering adding units or a rental.

Working with a Lawndale agent

Lawndale rewards an agent who checks the parcel rather than the city, because the two school districts, the mixed zoning and the varied permit history all cut through it street by street.

Chhabria Real Estate Company works the South Bay from the Palos Verdes Peninsula through the beach cities and inland. If you are weighing a specific address here, we are glad to walk it with you, including the parts that do not photograph well.

Nearby communities

• Redondo Beach, immediately west and south
• Torrance, to the south
• Gardena, to the east
• El Segundo, north toward the aerospace corridor

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