Ladera Ranch, CA Real Estate

Ladera Ranch is an unincorporated planned community located in south Orange County, California just outside the city limits of San Juan Capistrano and Mission Viejo. It was built on lands of the Ranch Mission Viejo Ranch, the largest working ranch in Orange County.

The community has several features that
differentiate it from most others. For example, many traffic speed-reducing measures were put into use. Roundabouts, for example, are commonplace on smaller intersections, instead of the familiar 4-way stop. Narrow street widths are characteristics of Ladera Ranch's small residential streets. Landscaped street medians are common, even on two-lane collector streets like O'Neill and Sienna Parkways.

In Ladera Ranch, there are two different types of areas: villages and neighborhoods. Individual builders produce an area that is called a neighborhood. There are ten or more neighborhoods per village, and there are nine villages. Five of the nine villages have clubhouses themed on a particular architecture style that is emphasized within that village. There are also parks, pools, playgrounds and open areas within each village. Only the Covenant Hills village is a fully guard-gated closed community. The rest are open.

Covenant Hills features several neighborhoods developed by high end builders and several streets of purely custom homesites with custom estate homes pricing upwards of $5 million. Custom homes built on spec and lots for custom homes are both available.
A unique development, Banister Street, located in the village of Terramor was built as a "live-at-home / work-at-home" neighborhood.

Each Banister Street residence has a service-based business on the ground level. The businesses in Banister Street include art music and cooking schools. Another live-work development in Ladera Ranch is called Front Street and features offices, salons, and a preschool and ad agency. There are several general purpose shopping centers.

Residents of Ladera Ranch enjoy the various clubhouses in addition to a water park, a skate park, and miles of manicured hiking trails for runners, walkers and mountain bikers. Ladera Ranch will add 5 more villages over the next few years. The next new village will be south of Covenant Hills right next to Ortega Highway. In addition to existing homes, there are currently 3 tracts of new homes being sold, all in the million-plus range.

A corporation was set up to maintain the common areas, and there is a homeowners association, the Ladera Ranch Maintenance Corporation. The association sponsors activities such as movies in the park and a Certified Farmers Market at the town green every Saturday morning.

As all parcels in Ladera Ranch come under the jurisdiction of a Homeowner’s Association, all potential buyers should have a careful look at the CC&R’s as well as individual neighborhood rules and by-laws. Also, be sure to factor in monthly HOA dues.

While a semi-rural area, Ladera Ranch is very high-tech: the area has state-of-the-art fiber-coax network technology installed, natural water filtration systems and green waste recycling programs that are the envy of horticulturists, a complex central irrigation system that saves millions of gallons of water and laser guided robots cleaning the community pools at night.

Ladera Ranch can be reached from Interstate 5 off either the Oso Parkway or Ortega Highway exits. The nearest mass transit is at the San Juan Capistrano station, where there is both Amtrak and Metrolink service to Los Angeles and San Diego.
The community is served by the Capistrano Unified School District.