Wilshire Montana Condos for Sale

About the Neighborhood

Between the Boulevard and the Avenue

Wilshire Montana is one of the few Santa Monica neighborhoods whose name is genuinely the map. The Wilshire Montana Neighborhood Coalition, known universally as Wilmont and one of seven neighborhood groups the city recognizes, defines the district as Wilshire Boulevard on the south, Montana Avenue and both its frontages on the north, Pacific Coast Highway on the west and 21st Street on the east. That is a compact rectangle of ten or so blocks by twenty, and it is the densest residential ground in the city outside downtown. Locals say Wilmont; listings say Wilshire Montana; buyers searching for Wilshire Montana condos are looking at the same blocks.

The building stock is the point of difference. Where the 90402 north of Montana is single-family houses on deep lots, the blocks immediately south are multi-family: 1920s and 1930s courtyard apartments, postwar walk-ups, mid-century and 1960s blocks with subterranean parking, and later condominium construction filling in among them. Some streets keep original duplexes and small single-family houses. The district's landmark is the Charmont Apartments at 330 California Avenue, a five-storey 1929 building by architect Max Maltzman that blends Mediterranean and Art Deco detailing, designated a City of Santa Monica landmark in October 1994 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

One date explains most of the ownership pattern. Santa Monica's rent control charter amendment was adopted on April 10, 1979, and units built after that date are exempt; units created by conversion rather than new construction are not automatically exempt. That single line has shaped four decades of decisions about which buildings became for-sale condominiums, which stayed rental, and what a removal permit or vested-right determination is worth. Buyers should treat a unit's rent-control status, its conversion history and its parking rights as diligence items rather than assumptions, and confirm them with the Rent Control Board and the association rather than the listing sheet.

The trade for density is that almost nothing requires a car. Montana Avenue's low-rise retail spine runs along the northern boundary, thickest between roughly 7th and 17th Streets, with coffee, groceries, fitness and the Aero Theatre. Wilshire carries the services and the crosstown buses. Downtown Santa Monica, the Third Street Promenade and the pier are a walk or short ride south; Palisades Park's blufftop path and the beach are at the western edge. Santa Monica-Malibu Unified serves the district, with Roosevelt Elementary on Montana and Lincoln Middle School on California Avenue both inside the boundaries.

Diligence here is building diligence. Read the reserve study, the master insurance policy and the assessment history before the aesthetics persuade you. Ask directly about seismic retrofit status, since Santa Monica has run its own soft-storey and unreinforced-masonry programs and many of these buildings predate current standards. Confirm exactly how many parking spaces convey and whether they are deeded or assigned. Check the rent-control and conversion record for any unit that has been tenanted. And confirm what a listing means by Wilshire Montana, because the label sometimes travels east of 21st Street or north of Montana where the rules and the stock are different.