If you own land in Pacific Palisades right now, you are probably tired of being told what to do with it. Rebuild. Sell. Wait. Everyone has an opinion, and most of them come from people who do not have to live with the result. So let me do something different here. I am not going to tell you what to do. I am going to give you the numbers, tell you what I am seeing on the ground, and let you decide what is right for your family.
Here is where the market actually stands roughly eighteen months after the fire.
The rebuild is real, but it is uneven
As of early 2026, more than 2,600 residential rebuild permits had been issued across the Palisades and Altadena combined. That sounds like a lot until you remember nearly 13,000 homes were lost. We are talking about roughly one permit for every five homes. Another 3,340 permits are sitting in review. The activity is genuine, but the Palisades is earlier in its cycle than Altadena. Grading and site-prep permits have been outpacing new-construction filings, which tells you a lot of owners are still clearing and deciding rather than framing walls.
Translation: if it feels like your block is moving slowly, you are not imagining it. You are normal.
Land sales are climbing, and investors noticed first
About 683 lots are now active, in escrow, or already sold. That is close to half of the inventory people expected to eventually hit the market. Lots have been trading around $1.6 million on average, while current listings ask considerably more, with undeveloped Palisades parcels averaging north of $2.2 million.
Now the part that matters for you as an owner. In the third quarter of 2025, investors bought roughly 40 percent of the vacant lots sold in the Palisades. Before the fire, investor activity in Palisades dirt was basically zero. That shift is not automatically good or bad. It means there is real demand for your land. It also means the people on the other side of the table negotiate for a living, and some of them are counting on sellers being exhausted, underinsured, and ready to take the first reasonable offer.
Insurance is quietly driving a lot of these decisions
Plenty of owners are not selling because they want to. They are selling because the math of rebuilding stopped working. California homeowner premiums have climbed sharply this decade, the FAIR Plan is stretched thin, and rebuild costs plus financing at today's rates near 6.5 percent push some families past what their payout will cover. If that is your situation, selling is not a failure. It is a clear-eyed financial decision, and it deserves representation that treats it that way.
So, rebuild or sell?
Lean toward rebuilding if your insurance settlement plus available cash realistically covers construction, you want to stay rooted in the community, and you can carry the timeline without it wrecking your finances. Lean toward selling if the rebuild gap is large, the multi-year process is more than you want to take on, or your life has already moved somewhere else. There is no wrong answer here. There is only the answer that fits your numbers and your family.
What I will push back on is selling in a hurry to the first investor who knocks, with no comparable analysis and no one in your corner. That is where people leave real money on the table.
Why I structured my Palisades work the way I did
In 2025, in the months after the fire, I got a fast, up-close education in this market from a long-time Palisades resident who walked me through it block by block. That kind of ground-level perspective is hard to pull from a market report. It showed me how this neighborhood actually trades and how often sellers overpay in commission for representation that is mostly a sign in the yard.
For Palisades land sellers, I list at a 1 percent flat listing fee. Not because your lot is worth less, but because you have already lost enough. A vacant parcel does not require staging, dozens of showings, or the full marketing lift of a finished home. The fee should reflect the actual work, and the savings should stay with the family that is trying to rebuild a life, whether that is here or somewhere new.
If you want a straight read on what your lot is worth in today's market, what comparable parcels are actually closing for, and whether rebuilding or selling makes more sense for your situation, let's talk. No pressure, no pitch. Just the real numbers and an honest opinion.
Justin Bonney, Clear Way Real Estate
DRE #01338897 | (818) 697-4884
15233 Ventura Blvd, Suite 500, Sherman Oaks
