Hollywood Hills Homes
Do you want to create the very next number one hit in the privacy of your own home? Then, investing in real estate in Los Angeles is for you. According to a recent article in Curbed LA, there are more home recording studios – some on par with professional studios – in Los Angeles than anywhere else in the world.
There are so many home recording studios that commercial recording studios are feeling the pinch.
“They did take a hit, definitely,” says Ellis Sorkin, president of Studio Referral Services in Calabasas, CA, a company that’s been matching clients’ recording needs with the appropriate studios since 1980. Of the roughly 30 major commercial facilities that existed in the area a decade ago, a third have closed or been sold “to producers and artists that had the wherewithal to buy these million-dollar-plus facilities and have their own complexes,” Sorkin says.
His company, which deals with some 700 studios worldwide, includes in that number LA residential studios that are “significant. There are a number of them that are pretty serious professional set-ups.”
However, these home studios are not precisely legal, and most homeowners and inspectors prefer to follow a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy according to Luke Zamperini, Chief Inspector for the City of Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety.
“People convert their garages to other uses, and sometimes people make recording studios,” he says. “If music is someone’s hobby, that’s not a problem, as long as they can provide the required two off-street covered parking spaces elsewhere on the property. But if it’s a professional recording studio it needs to be in a commercial zone.”
In fact, home recording studios are becoming so ubiquitous in Los Angeles that if you are an artist, and don’t have a home recording studio, it can be difficult to find work. I am guilty of having a professional recording studio in my house too, designed by world-class acoustician Hanson Hsu who is responsible for designing the studio at Universal Mastering. Having a studio in the comfort of your house is extremely convenient and I get to see more of my husband.
If you own luxury real estate in Los Angeles, a home recording studio is simply another luxury feature like a screening room, wine cellar or ballroom that adds value and increases the marketability of the home especially in areas where recording studios are in high demand such as the Hollywood Hills, Sunset Strip, West Hollywood and Los Feliz.
If you are an entertainer hoping to buy Los Angeles real estate, you can list a recording studio as one of your “must have features” and expect to find a rich selection of LA homes that meet your needs throughout the city.
So, if a home recording studio is something you want in your next home, you can find it in Los Angeles. Contact me today and I will help you find that special musical space.
To read the complete Curbed LA article, please click here.
Susan Andrews | Estates Director
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Susan Andrews is your ultimate real estate source for Los Angeles, California and surrounding communities.
Photo courtesy of Curbed LA.