About the Building
Ocean Park Plaza is a twelve-home condominium of 1976 at 2613 Sixth Street, and the Los Angeles County Assessor confirms it as a genuine for-sale condominium. The roll carries twelve separately assessed parcels legally described as Condominium Tract 30840, Condominium Unit one through twelve, each returning a condominium use description. Individual homes can be conveyed and financed on their own. Ten of the twelve carry a 2613 Sixth Street situs address; units seven and eleven are addressed 2615 Sixth Street, which is why a search on the primary address returns only ten records.
That address split is the first thing to understand about the record here. A buyer searching public data or ordering a title report on 2613 alone will see a partial picture of the association. The controlling identifier is the tract, not the street number: all twelve homes sit on Condominium Tract 30840, and the association covers all of them regardless of which number appears on the door. Confirm the tract on the preliminary title report rather than the street address, and expect the two numbers to appear across the governing documents.
The area figures are the second thing. The assessor records 934 square feet on every single unit sampled, across units one, five, seven, ten and twelve, each with two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Condominium directories publish ranges of 934 to 1,280 square feet and roughly 1,000 to 1,300 square feet for the same homes. Where an assessor's figure is uniform and an aggregator's is a range, the usual explanation is that the roll records main-building area only and excludes a loft or mezzanine and the garage, both of which these homes are described as having.
That reading is consistent with the format. Directories describe two-storey townhouses with a loft area, a fireplace in the living room, in-unit laundry, a private patio, a primary suite with vaulted ceilings and a balcony, and a private two-car garage for each home. A loft under a vaulted ceiling is precisely the kind of space an assessor may exclude and an agent will always include. The practical consequence is that the home will feel larger than 934 square feet and will appraise against comparables measured the same way, so establish early which standard a given number uses.
The site density is tight and it shapes the building. Roughly 11,999 square feet of land carrying twelve homes is about a thousand square feet of land per residence, which on two storeys with private garages means a compact site plan with minimal circulation and very little slack for guest parking. Nothing about that is unusual for an Ocean Park subdivision of the mid-1970s, but it does mean the deeded garage is the whole of a home's parking provision and that visitors will be looking for kerbside space on a permit-controlled street.
Amenities & Services
The Residences
Every parcel sampled on the assessor's roll returns 934 square feet with two bedrooms and two bathrooms, across units spread through the numbering rather than clustered. That uniformity is the defining fact about this building: there is one product, repeated, with mirrored variants and different positions on the site. It makes valuation unusually clean, because differences between sales reduce to condition, orientation, outdoor space and which end of the site a home occupies. Confirm the specific home against the recorded condominium plan, but expect the plan to repeat. Uniformity also makes a poorly presented home unusually easy to price.
Directories describe a loft area in these homes and publish areas up to around 1,300 square feet, while the assessor records a flat 934 square feet. That gap is almost certainly the loft and the garage, which assessors commonly exclude from main-building area and agents almost never do. Neither figure is wrong; they measure different things. The practical point is to establish which standard any number in front of you uses before comparing it to anything, and to read the dimensions off the recorded plan. Lenders and appraisers will generally work from the smaller figure.
Descriptions of these homes put a vaulted ceiling, a balcony and a dual-sink bathroom with a separate tub and shower in the primary suite at the upper level. In a two-storey townhouse of this size, that arrangement gives the home its sense of volume and is where most of the perceived space above the assessed area comes from. It also puts a balcony and, in some plans, a loft opening over the living room, both of which are elements to look at closely for waterproofing and for guard rail compliance.
A fireplace in the living room is described consistently across these homes. At fifty years old, the questions are the condition of the firebox and flue, whether a gas line has been fitted, and whether the chimney has ever been assessed for seismic performance, since masonry chimneys on wood-framed buildings of this period are a recognised vulnerability. Ask whether the flue is maintained by the owner or the association, and whether any chimney work in the building has been carried out under permit. Ask whether the fireplace has been used recently and whether the association has any rule restricting wood burning.
Each home is described as having a private two-car garage, which on a site of roughly 11,999 square feet carrying twelve homes is a generous provision and accounts for a large share of the ground plane. It gives each residence a secure second entrance and makes two vehicles practical in a district where kerbside parking is permit-controlled and heavily used. Confirm from the title report exactly what conveys, and read the CC and Rs on responsibility for the garage door, its opener and the driveway apron. Guest capacity beyond the garages is likely to be minimal on a site this size.
Private patios appear in every description of these homes, and on a compact site the value of that outdoor space depends heavily on where the home sits. A patio facing the street reads differently from one facing an interior court or a neighbouring property line. The same applies to light: in a two-storey terrace arrangement, end positions get windows on three sides and interior positions get two. Walk the site rather than the floor plan, and do it at the time of day you would actually use the patio. Light and noise vary more here than the plan suggests.
Due Diligence
The assessor carries twelve parcels on Condominium Tract 30840. Ten have a 2613 Sixth Street situs address and units seven and eleven are addressed 2615 Sixth Street. A search on 2613 alone returns ten records and understates the association by two homes. Work from the tract number on the preliminary title report rather than the street address, and expect both numbers to appear in the governing documents and in insurance and lender paperwork.
The roll gives a flat 934 square feet on every unit sampled while directories publish figures up to around 1,300 square feet. The likely difference is the loft and the garage, which the assessor excludes from main-building area. Establish which standard any figure uses before relying on it, especially in an appraisal or a price-per-square-foot comparison, and take the dimensions from the recorded condominium plan where the number is material.
Los Angeles City Ordinances 183893 and 184081 do not apply in Santa Monica. The city adopted its own seismic retrofit programme in March 2017 under Ordinance 2537, codified across municipal code chapters 8.58 to 8.80, covering unreinforced masonry, concrete tilt-up, soft-story, non-ductile concrete and steel moment frame buildings constructed under codes enacted before 10 November 1980. Notices went to identified properties between May 2017 and August 2018, with compliance running from the notice date.
Two storeys of wood framing sitting over a line of two-car garages is the configuration the soft-story category was written to describe, and a 1976 completion is inside the pre-1980 code window. The city's priority tiers place buildings of seven to fifteen units in a later tier than larger soft-story buildings, which affects timing rather than applicability. Ask the association for any Building Officer order, the engineer's evaluation report and any permit issued in response.
Santa Monica has operated a seismic retrofit grant programme for eligible owners, with reporting indicating an application deadline of 31 August 2026 and a requirement that construction not begin before approval is granted. Deadlines and eligibility for programmes of this kind change, so confirm current terms with the city's building and safety division rather than relying on a secondary source. If this building has an outstanding obligation, the funding question belongs in the same conversation.
Condominiums are generally exempt from Santa Monica rent ceilings under Costa-Hawkins, but a narrow exception applies to condominiums in buildings completed before 10 April 1979 where the tenancy began on or before 1 January 1996. A 1976 building sits inside that window. If the home is tenanted, establish the tenancy start date and check the unit's registration status with the Santa Monica Rent Control Board before removing contingencies. Take advice before serving notice on a sitting tenant.
The assessor's roll carries an Ocean Park district designation for these parcels rather than a citywide residential classification. Twelve homes on roughly 11,999 square feet is denser than that low-scale framework would ordinarily produce today, which typically puts a building of this kind in a legal nonconforming position. Ask City Planning for the current designation and check the association's master insurance for ordinance and law coverage, which is what pays the gap after a substantial loss.
Santa Monica's home-sharing ordinance, chapter 6.20 of the municipal code adopted in May 2015, bans vacation rentals of thirty consecutive days or less unless a primary resident remains on site throughout the stay, and it applies to condominiums. Permitted home-sharing requires a city business licence and enforcement has included daily fines. Ocean Park's proximity to the beach makes this a common assumption, so confirm the rule and the association's own minimum lease term before purchase.
Everything above is drawn from public records, city permit data and published sources. The association’s statutory disclosure package is the only authoritative answer on dues, rules, reserves, insurance and litigation — Ben will request it and read it with you before you remove contingencies.
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