You don’t have to be rich to live in Venice


By Jim Smith

Contrary to popular belief, it is possible to live in Venice on a moderate or low income. Lots of people do it. This Beachhead exclusive will unveil many of their secrets. If you have enough income to live in Venice without making compromises, congratulations. This article is intended for those who must be financially creative if they are to live in our fair city.


Two things are required to survive in Venice without riches:
1. Adopt a Venice lifestyle.
2. Be sociable.

There’s more involved, so let me explain. A Venice lifestyle is almost un-American since it means that you’ll withdraw, to the extent possible, from being a consumer. You won’t buy the “latest thing,” and you’ll recoil in horror from advertising pitches. The Venice lifestyle means pulling out of the rat race. Work if you must, but don’t think that’s all there is to life (or even one of the most important things).
Some elements of the Venice lifestyle include killing your TV, shopping in thrift stores, getting rid of your car or if that isn’t possible, using it only for trips outside Venice. Within Venice, whenever possible bike, walk and/or skate.

A Venice lifestyle doesn’t mean you don’t have any fun or become a recluse. Quite the contrary. You’ll make more friends on the sidewalk than the freeway. And Venice is full of free entertainment. There’s Ocean Front Walk and the Beach, of course. There are also lots of free, or nearly free, art shows, performances, films, and readings within walking distance. Besides being healthier than consumerism and careerism, the Venice lifestyle is much, much cheaper.

Secondly, be sociable. The mass media, the neo-cons and virtually all of the powers-that-be in the US have preached a doctrine during the last 40 years of the rugged individual. This has resulted in the privatization of personal life, even in Venice. Humans are mammals and are, by nature, sociable. Since we were sleeping in trees together, people have wanted to be together and to live together. The (well named) nuclear family replaced the extended family (grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins) a couple of generations ago in most capitalist countries.

The result has been alienation, suicide, mental illness, drastically increased crime, not to mention homelessness and poverty. Recently, even the nuclear family has fractured into separate domiciles for mom, dad, and each of the kids. Grandma’s in a warehouse, euphemistically called a “home.” If you want to live in Venice without much money, you’ll have to resurrect the extended family. The good news is that you can do it with people with whom you’re not related.

Let’s break it down to some of the main barriers to enjoying Venice on pennies a day:

Rental Housing – Rents and home ownership prices are through the roof. How can anyone possibly afford to live in Venice.

If you’re renting, a commune is the answer. It is a group of people who pool their meager resources to be able to afford a $2,000 or $3,000 a month rental. Yuppies are able to afford to rent - or buy - in Venice because they often have two high incomes as professionals. So why can’t a group of artists, students, immigrants, blue collar workers and others who have long lived in Venice do the same? In fact, they can.

There are quite a few communes in Venice, even if they don’t all identify themselves as such. Think of the possibilities of renting a three-bedroom house with a den and garage. A garage can easily be remodeled, without making permanent structural changes, into one, two or three bedrooms (especially if there’s no car in it). Eight people paying rent on a $2,400/mo. house works out to $300 each. Now we’re back to rent levels of the good ol’ days. Or you might want to apportion the rent by each person’s ability to pay. In this way, the commune shows its social consciousness. Consider inviting a homeless person to share the commune, while those who have incomes pick up the slack.

Communes work best when its members have something in common. If everyone’s a musician, artist, political activist or student, it will last longer than if they just want cheap rent.

Buying a home – You can buy a home in Venice for $200,000 or slightly more. The secret is forming a Cooperative. This form of ownership is used extensively in New York City and civilized parts of Europe to spread home ownership to people who otherwise would be renters.

It works this way: a group of people who have the ability to borrow or otherwise raise a share of the down payment form what lawyers call a Limited Liability Corporation (LLC). If there are 10 units on the property and the Cooperative is able to buy it for $2 million, that works out to just $200,000 for your own home in Venice. The LLC is the legal owner of the apartment house or courtyard apartments, and each resident is a member of its Board.

This is not the way to go if you want to be a land speculator. When you leave, you must sell your apartment or house back to the Cooperative for roughly what you paid for it. But in the meantime, you’re paying a mortgage, not a rent, and you are secure in your home. A cooperative can also be a stabilizing force and center of activity in your neighborhood. Find a property that includes a commons area where the cooperative members and neighbors can socialize.

Since you are the owners of the property, you can throw community parties, stage art shows and hold community meetings without worrying about the reaction of an evil landlord. And, you won’t be a stranger in an apartment building if you are part of a cooperative.

Transportation – Venice has better mass transport than does most of the Los Angeles area. The Santa Monica Blue Bus is efficient, runs frequently, covers much of the Bay Cities, and is relatively cheap. It’s 75 cents per ride cash, or with the Little Blue Card, 70 cents. Seniors aged 62 and older, and persons with disabilities and Medicare recipients ride for just 25 cents. The Little Blue Card can be obtained at the Check Cashing place at Lincoln and Rose and other locations in Santa Monica. The Culver City Bus lines are also 75 cents. They’ll take you to - Culver City.

Biking is nearly free once you pay for the bicycle. If you have a problem with your bike, you can take it to Manny at his bike shop on Lincoln Blvd. He’ll fix it, or sell you a new or used bike at prices that can’t be beat. A Beachhead article in the November 2002 issue timed typical bike trips around Venice and found that you could bike from one end of our town to the other end in 10 minutes. Most trips in Venice were 5 minutes or less. You can’t find a parking place for your car that fast.

Venice has always been a walking community, in contrast to L.A. The same survey mentioned above found that most walking trips around Venice were 10-20 minutes. Saving money (the point of this article) is easy to do if you get rid of your car, or just use it occasionally. In addition, you’ll help the environment and your physical health.

Food – It’s possible to spend more money on a meal in some Venice restaurants than millions of people in the world make in a year. It’s also possible to reduce the cost of food, and improve its quality dramatically.

Some ideas:
1) form a “buyers club” with your neighbors - once a week someone will take the group’s “to buy” list to the Central Market downtown and return with low-cost food;
2) help get a community garden started - there are several city-owned empty lots that could be used for planting and there are privately-owned lots that might be available if the city would pay the insurance - talk to our new city councilmember, Bill Rosendahl about this;
3) shop at farmers markets;
4) become a vegetarian;
5) eat at home, and have pot luck dinners with your neighbors once a week;
6) You can also get a lot of bargains at Trader Joe’s, like good table wine for $2.
7) Eat out at reasonably priced places, like the truck on Rose Avenue, the South Beach Cafe (on North Beach), the HOT on Pacific and Cafe 50s on Lincoln.

Public Safety – Venice still scares the hell out of many new arrivals. That’s why they immediately put up big fences and get mean dogs. But they’re still more likely to get ripped off because it looks like they’re hiding a lot of loot behind those bars and security systems.

No matter how many new police are hired, or how many private security guards prowl around, there will never be enough cops to make the well-off feel safe from the poor. In Venice, the solution is to invite the neighborhood in, instead of keeping it out. Blend in with the community. Take down those ugly fences, put up some art work or peace signs, play with the neighbor kids, hang out in the front yard and talk to people. In other words, be a Venetian in more than just an address.

Form a block club whose main function is not to call in the cops, but to hold pot luck dinners, throw block parties and look out for each other in more ways than just crime protection. When you’ve dumped that SUV for a bicycle and you’re wearing cool clothes from the thrift store, and you’ve contributed some time to the community, the “bad guys” in the neighborhood will be more likely to protect you than to rip you off.

Posted: Mon - August 1, 2005 at 02:26 PM          

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