Franklin Hills · Downsizing
Downsizing From a Franklin Hills Home
One plan for the sale and the move, from what to keep to the day you close.
What does downsizing from a Franklin Hills home involve?
Downsizing from a Franklin Hills home means selling a hillside house you have probably owned for a long time and moving to a smaller place on a calendar you set. The two plans move together. One sells the house on the eastern hill of Los Feliz. The other gets you settled somewhere with fewer stairs and less to look after. On this site, luxury starts at about $2 million.
Three things make this sale its own case here. The house has a history, and after decades of ownership the records of that history are often in a drawer or nowhere at all. The lot is a slope, and buyers will ask about the walls and the drainage as closely as the kitchen. Many homes here have city views, and the view is the part of the house you have stopped noticing and the part a buyer will notice first. Sorting the rooms, finding the papers and showing the view are the three jobs that run alongside the ordinary steps of a sale.
Start with your move date and work backward. Our post on planning a downsizing sale from a Los Feliz luxury home covers the sequence and the sorting method in depth. This page is about what changes when the house is in Franklin Hills.
What does a long-owned house on the eastern hill bring to the sale?
A story that may be on the record. Franklin Hills has no historic district, so a house here is either individually recorded or it is not. The City's SurveyLA report names the 1953 Schlessinger House on Myra Avenue by R.M. Schindler and a 1936 Streamline Moderne house on Franklin Avenue. The City has designated the Van Pelt Estate on Lyric Avenue and the Paul Lauritz House on Clayton Avenue as Historic-Cultural Monuments. If your house is one of those, or has a Mills Act contract, that status goes in the story and the disclosures. If it is not, the story is the house itself and what you have done with it.
Decades of work on a slope. A retaining wall, a deck, a new drainage line or an addition. Each should have a permit, and buyers ask for them. When the permits are not in the house, we pull what the City has on file. Starting that search early is one of the best things a downsizing seller can do, because the City's records take time.
The view and the light. A view that faces the city reads differently at noon and at dusk. We plan the photo day and the in-house Matterport scan around the hour it shows best, and we clear the rooms in front of the windows first.
The neighborhood a buyer is choosing. The Los Feliz Neighborhood Council bounds Franklin Hills by Franklin Avenue and Tracy Street, Commonwealth Avenue and Hoover Street, Fountain Avenue and Hyperion Avenue. The 1926 Shakespeare Bridge on Franklin Avenue is Historic-Cultural Monument #126. Speranza and Hyperion Public are nearby restaurants. Your listing places the house against those landmarks so a buyer who is new to the hill knows exactly where it stands.
How does Rooster Homes handle a downsizing sale in Franklin Hills?
Rooster Homes builds the listing calendar around your move date. Rooster Homes is a Los Feliz, Los Angeles real estate team led by Brandon and Sarah Arlington (DRE #02051216). The method is the same four pillars we use on every luxury listing. Two of them do the most work for a downsizing seller on this hill.
Equity is the price and the reasoning behind it. For a long-owned home the sale touches your taxes and your next purchase, so we welcome your CPA and your lender into the pricing conversation and share the comparable sales with them directly. If comparable sales point near the Measure ULA line, we run the city transfer tax math before a number is chosen. If your plan needs a rent-back so you can close the sale and stay a few weeks while the next home finishes, we build it into the offer strategy from the start.
Campaign is what keeps the rest of your life on schedule. Escrow and disclosures start moving within hours of signing. After every showing and open house you get a real, specific update: who toured, what they said and what it means for the next step. Weekly progress updates run through closing. When you are sorting rooms and booking movers in the same weeks, those updates are how you know when to book the truck.
Rooster Homes owns its own Matterport camera. The 3D tour is shot in-house once the rooms are ready, so buyers can walk the house at any hour while you get on with the move.
A downsizing timeline for a Franklin Hills seller
- Set the move date. Every other date works backward from the day you want to be in the next home.
- Choose the order. Sell first for a clear number, buy first to move once, or close both close together with a backup plan.
- Bring in your CPA and lender. Share the timeline so they see the sale and the next purchase together.
- Request the City's records now. Monument status for the address, any Mills Act contract and the permits for hillside work. This takes longer than you expect.
- Measure the next home. Its rooms and closets decide what comes with you.
- Sort one room at a time. Start with the rooms you use least. Keep, sell, donate or give to relatives. Clear the rooms with the view first, because they photograph best.
- Prepare the house. We walk it with you and put a date on each task. Small repairs come before larger projects, and we talk through which projects matter before you spend.
- Photograph and scan at the right hour. Professional photos and the in-house Matterport tour once the rooms are ready and the light is right.
- Launch with the same-day kickoff. Escrow, HOA documents where any apply and disclosures move within hours of signing.
- Review every update and weigh the offers. A rent-back goes into the offer terms if your plan needs one.
- Close and move. Weekly updates continue through the final day.
This page explains how the process works. It is not tax or legal advice. For your own situation, talk with your CPA or attorney as well.
Ready to plan the move from the hill?
Our page on downsizing from a larger Los Feliz home covers the plan for the whole area. The Franklin Hills neighborhood page has the landmarks and the setting your listing will lean on. For the presentation and launch without the moving calendar, read selling a luxury home in Franklin Hills. If you are comparing notes with a friend on the other hill, downsizing from a home in the Los Feliz Hills covers that slope.
When you have a move date in mind, tell us about it or call (323) 201-2724 and let us know what works best for you. We will coordinate our schedule around yours.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can the Matterport tour of my Franklin Hills house be shot before I finish sorting?
It is better to wait. The 3D tour records each room as it looks that day, and buyers walk it more than once. We shoot it in-house once the rooms are ready, and we start with the rooms in front of the view because those photograph best. Sorting the rest can continue behind closed doors.
Which papers should I look for first on a Franklin Hills house I have owned for decades?
Permits and plans for anything done to the slope: retaining walls, drainage, decks and additions. Then any record of the architect or the year the house was built, and any Mills Act contract or Historic-Cultural Monument paperwork. Whatever you cannot find, we request from the City, and that search starts early.
If I want to stay in Los Feliz, where do I start looking for a smaller home?
Start with the area guides. Los Feliz Village is the flatter commercial stretch south of Los Feliz Boulevard along Vermont Avenue, and it is the nearest hub to Franklin Hills. We tour the next home and sell the current one as one plan, so the two closings can be timed together or bridged with a rent-back.
Franklin Hills
What downsizing looks like in Franklin Hills
Eclectic hillside homes on the eastern hill of Los Feliz, gathered around the 1926 Shakespeare Bridge, many with city views.
Franklin Hills is the eastern hill of Los Feliz. It rises between Franklin Avenue and Fountain Avenue and runs east to the Silver Lake line at Hyperion Avenue.
- The homes
- Eclectic hillside homes around the Shakespeare Bridge, many with city views. Landmarked examples range from Storybook to Streamline Moderne to midcentury work by Schindler, Soriano and Lautner.
- Nearby
- Speranza and Hyperion Public restaurants. Silver Lake begins across Hyperion Avenue, the eastern edge of the neighborhood.
- The trade-off
- The homes sit on a hill above a 35-foot ravine, so views come with slopes. No HPOZ or historic district covers the area, so landmark protection sits on individual monuments.
The method
How we do it in Franklin Hills
Downsizing: keep exploring
Ready to make your move with Rooster Homes?