Santa Barbara, California

Santa Barbara is the personification of the upscale California lifestyle. It’s a place with a lot to do but also the feel of a welcoming small town, with year-round surfing and high-quality wineries nearly in your backyard. Good place for families? You bet, with some of the highest-rated public schools in the country. Good place for young adults? Heck yeah, UC Santa Barbara has one of the liveliest social scenes around and overall the nightlife is topnotch for every age range. A good place to retire? Great weather and access to a ton of outdoor activities consistently puts Santa Barbara near the top of retirement rankings.

Unfortunately, the beach vibes aren’t the only California characteristics Santa Barbara embodies. You’re going to have to cough up seven figures if you’re looking to buy a house for the family, and California taxes do add up. Situated between San Francisco and Los Angeles, SB is a little cheaper than some neighborhoods in those markets, but that’s like saying silver is cheaper than gold. Sit down with your finance guru before you prepare to settle down on the Santa Barbara beaches for 300 days a year. The city also wrestles with homelessness problems like the ones SF and LA can’t solve, so be prepared for that in certain areas as well.

Santa Barbara is relatively small, just a hair over 20 square miles, but there are a lot of distinct neighborhoods and living styles to choose from. “Downtown” is mostly low-slung shops and restaurants rather than the high-rises of SF and LA. Downtown housing includes beautiful old Spanish architecture-style homes in addition to lots of apartment/ condo living options.

Isla Vista is where you’ll probably look first if you’re attending or working at UCSB. It’s got a mix of traditional Spanish/craftsman, contemporary homes, and apartments and like most of Santa Barbara, is a short walk or bike from the beach.

Neighborhoods like Mission Canyon, that are on the edge of town, are good spots for bigger families. Large Spanish homes and access to museums, gardens, and trails give it more of a suburban vibe. Riviera is one of the schmanciest neighborhoods in the country, with beautiful Mediterranean-style homes and prices consistently over 3 million.

To see what locals get up to for fun in Santa Barbara check out the calendar of events.

We highly recommend visiting Santa Barbara and staying in the community in a VRBO rather than a hotel to get a feel for what it's like to live among the locals. You can receive discounted fares on travel via our partnership with Expedia as well.

With more and more jobs shifting remote, the time to live by the beach is now assuming you’ve got the cheddar, People do come here for the waves and students come for the college, but everything Santa Barbara has to offer makes it so much more than simply a beach or a college town.