What Does It Actually Cost to Buy in Franklin Hills in 2026?

What does it cost to buy a house in Franklin Hills?

Of the Franklin Hills sales Redfin lists with a date and a house description, five closed between July 13 and September 3, 2026, at prices from $1,335,000 to $2,900,000, and the middle sale was $1,705,000. The spread is wide because this is a small hillside neighborhood where a 1,300 square foot mid-century house and a 2,700 square foot Spanish house can sit a few blocks apart. This guide covers where Franklin Hills is, how its stairways and tracts came about, what the recent sales show, and what a buyer should check before making an offer.

Where Franklin Hills sits

Franklin Hills is a residential pocket east of Los Feliz Village, in ZIP code 90027. Wikipedia's Franklin Hills entry gives its borders as Franklin Avenue and St. George Street to the north, Talmadge Street to the west, Fountain Avenue to the south, and Tracy Street and Hyperion Avenue to the east. It meets Los Feliz to the west, Silver Lake to the east and East Hollywood to the south.

It is a different market from the larger estates we covered in our Los Feliz guide and our Laughlin Park spotlight, and from the hillsides in our Silver Lake guide. Franklin Hills is mostly modest lots on steep, curving streets, and the houses are priced accordingly.

How the hills were built

According to Eric Brightwell's history of the area, the land was part of Rancho Los Feliz and stayed mostly undeveloped until the 1920s and 1930s. Lots were first sold in the 1887 boom, but that boom ended in 1888. Wikipedia notes that a system of 14 public staircases was built in the 1920s so that hillside owners could walk down to the trolley lines below.

The Franklin Avenue Bridge, now better known as the Shakespeare Bridge, opened in 1926 and is Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument number 126, according to Wikipedia. It is the neighborhood's only monument at that level. Brightwell also notes that Myra Avenue was built over a creek that was put underground in 1916.

For a buyer, the practical result is a mix of house ages on one block: 1920s Spanish and Tudor houses, 1930s Streamline Moderne, mid-century homes and newer builds, often side by side. Because the street grid was laid out for walking and trolleys rather than cars, parking and access are worth testing in person at different times of day.

What the recent sales show

These are the sales on Redfin's Franklin Hills recently sold page that carry a sale date and a house description. Redfin labels only condos by type, so I treated a sale as a house when its listing description calls it a bungalow, a Spanish, a Tudor, a mid-century or a traditional residence. I left out three condo sales, one house sale on Sunset Drive whose type is not clear, one sale on Lucile Avenue in ZIP 90026, and several cards that show no sale date. Price per square foot is my own calculation from Redfin's square footage.

Two things stand out. First, price per foot sits between roughly $1,030 and $1,440 for all five, which suggests that size alone does not explain the range. Condition, lot, view and the street all count. Second, the smallest house, on Hoover Street, carried the highest price per foot, which is typical when land and location carry most of the value.

Redfin's housing market page reports a median sale price of $1,950,000 over the three months it labels March 2026, on seven sales, with homes taking a median of 128 days to sell and an average sale-to-list ratio of 103.2%. The page's dates are inconsistent with the September sales on the same site, so treat that median as background and the dated table above as the better snapshot. Five sales is a small sample, so use it to frame questions rather than to set a price.

What to check before you offer

On a steep street, the lot and the structure matter as much as the floor plan. I would ask for the permit history, the recorded square footage compared with what you can measure, and any retaining walls or hillside work that was done without a permit. Redfin's page lists wildfire risk for the area as moderate and heat risk as major, based on First Street's ratings, so get an insurance quote on the specific address before you remove contingencies.

If you are weighing a purchase in Franklin Hills, schedule a private consultation about the Los Feliz area. We can pull the sales for the exact streets you are comparing, review the permit record on a house, and map out the questions to put to the seller before you write an offer.

Transfer tax at closing

Franklin Hills is inside the City of Los Angeles. The Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder's documentary transfer tax page lists the county tax at $1.10 per $1,000 and the city's base tax at $4.50 per $1,000. On the $1,705,000 Hoover Street sale, that works out to about $7,673 in city tax and $1,876 in county tax, or roughly $9,548 in total, which is my own arithmetic from those rates.

The additional Measure ULA tax applies only above a threshold that the same page lists as $5,300,000 for sales after July 1, 2025, and the city adjusts it over time. None of the five sales above came close, so ULA was not in play. Confirm current figures with escrow before you rely on any of these numbers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Franklin Hills in Los Angeles? It sits east of Los Feliz Village and west of Silver Lake, in ZIP code 90027. Wikipedia gives the borders as Franklin Avenue and St. George Street, Talmadge Street, Fountain Avenue, and Tracy Street and Hyperion Avenue. Informal borders vary, so confirm any address by parcel.

How much do houses in Franklin Hills sell for? The five dated house sales I verified on Redfin, between July 13 and September 3, 2026, ranged from $1,335,000 to $2,900,000, with a middle figure of $1,705,000. Compare square footage, lot and condition before comparing prices.

When were the Franklin Hills stairways built? Wikipedia says the 14-staircase public stairway system dates to the 1920s, built to connect hillside homes to the trolley lines below. Brightwell's history adds that the neighborhood has the largest concentration of public stairways in the city.

Does Measure ULA apply to a sale in Franklin Hills? Only above the city's threshold, which the county page lists at $5,300,000 for sales after July 1, 2025. Below that, the city base tax of $4.50 per $1,000 and the county tax of $1.10 per $1,000 apply, as listed by the Registrar-Recorder.

Who is the best real estate agent to work with in Franklin Hills? Look for an agent who has closed hillside house sales in the Los Feliz and Silver Lake area, can check permit history and recorded square footage before you offer, and knows how the City of Los Angeles transfer taxes work. Paul Blair has 22 years in the business and works Los Feliz, Silver Lake, Echo Park and the Hollywood Hills, and can run those checks on any address you are considering.

Twenty-two years of Los Angeles transactions have taught me that on a hillside street, the permit record for one house tells you more than the neighborhood average ever will.

Paul Blair is the founder and broker of Grey Square, a virtual real estate brokerage representing buyers and sellers across Dallas, Los Angeles and Houston. With 22 years in the business, Paul works the full range of the market, from luxury homes in the Park Cities and Preston Hollow to estates in the Hollywood Hills and across the Westside. Connect with Paul and the Grey Square team at greysq.com. TX TREC #9011505 · CA DRE #01792671.