9:25am | There was a time atop Signal Hill where million dollar views were like a dime a dozen. Realtors and developers selling $1 million-and-up homes on the hilltop city that’s encompassed by Long Beach were busy beavers, building out once vacant lots in an area better known for oil wells… and empty lots.
A few years ago, it was hard to count the number of million-dollar homes for sale, being sold, and being built on Signal Hill. But in the last two years, development has literally ground to a halt as space for developing homes with million-dollar views that help give them that price tag has been used up, and $1 million home sales have become a rarity once again.
In what could be the last $1 million-plus listing in for a while, and if it’s sold, the first seven-figure sale in nearly the last two years, Keller Williams Realtor Richard Daskam this week has listed a four-bedroom, 4.5-bath Mediterranean-style property for $1.2 million.
“2339 E. Hill Street’s views are unbelievable,” said Daskam, who sold many of the city’s $1 million homes. Daskam sold well over 100 properties on Signal Hill during a six-year rush in the city during which about 250 homes were built and sold—roughly 10% of all of the city’s single-family homes were built between 2000 and the end of the housing market run-up.
“This home is located on one of the most premium, if not the premium buildable lots on top of Signal Hill,” Daskam said. “The view seems to go on forever and it is hard to believe that anything will ever be built that could significantly block the ocean, Catalina, and city views. The upgrades throughout the house are unique to the custom homes that our MLS calls ‘Hilltop Estates’ homes. These homes were mostly built on the lots that I sold for Signal Hill Petroleum back in 2002 to 2004.”
According to the MLS, Daskam can claim the record for the highest valued home sold on Signal Hill in 2010 at $850,000. And he doesn’t foresee too many $1 million sales anytime soon.
“There are other homes in Signal Hill that still have a $1 million-plus value, but I don’t foresee the market getting flooded by them,” he says. “As I always tell my clients, don’t sell your home unless you have to. And that is especially true right now.”
Other features include a formal living room, a large formal dining room with panoramic views, a granite kitchen with attached family room and fireplace. The three upstairs bedrooms each have a private bathroom; two master suites have access to an oversized balcony with panoramic views, and include a walk-in closet, three-way fireplace, a sitting area and private bathroom with Jacuzzi tub and separate shower.
For hundreds of years, Signal Hill has been valued by people for one reason or another. The Puvuvitam Indians used the hill to send smoke signals to their relations on Catalina Island, according to records that date back to the 1500s. Those natives were evidently also the first to discover value in oil. In the early 1540s, Spanish explorers noticed the natives using a naturally occurring tar obtained from steeps like Signal Hill to waterproof their canoes.
When oil was discovered on Signal Hill around 1916 the liquid helped kick-start the population boom in Long Beach.
And when the residential market took off after 2000, a few pioneers realized that the expense of capping off and removing some of the unused oil pumping equipment would be easily offset by the profit from building and selling homes on the hill, which is 365 feet above Long Beach. As the home-building rampage got started, builders quickly sold the houses for what were then considered astronomical prices.