What Does It Cost to Buy a House in Royal Woods, Sherman Oaks?

What does it cost to buy a house in Royal Woods?

Recent Royal Woods house sales on public records run from about $1.7 million to $2.5 million, and the two houses listed there in November 2026 are asking $2,950,000 and $3,295,000 on Redfin. For that money you get a 1950s or early 1960s house of roughly 2,700 to 3,700 square feet on a hillside lot that is often a third of an acre or more. This guide covers where Royal Woods sits, what the houses and lots are like, what the sales and current asks show, and the fire, permit and transfer tax questions to settle before you write an offer.

Where Royal Woods sits

Royal Woods is a hillside pocket of Sherman Oaks in ZIP code 91403, in the Santa Monica Mountains foothills south of Ventura Boulevard, close to where Sherman Oaks meets Encino. The line between the two is blurry enough that Redfin files some Royal Woods houses under Encino in its page navigation even though the mailing address reads Sherman Oaks. The streets carry the name: Royal Woods Drive, Royal Meadow Road, Royal Ridge Road and Valley Meadow Road wind up from the flats, and Redfin's Royal Woods Drive street index lists 66 addresses on that street alone.

It should not be confused with Royal Oaks, the Encino hillside section we covered in our Royal Oaks spotlight. The names are close and the two areas share a ridge line, but they are separate pockets with separate sales histories, and a comp from one does not price a house in the other.

Royal Woods is a short drive down to Ventura Boulevard and the 405 and 101 interchange. If you want the wider Sherman Oaks picture first, our Sherman Oaks neighborhood guide covers the flats north and south of Ventura, and our Longridge Estates guide covers the hillside section farther east.

What the houses are like

The housing stock is almost entirely single-family and mostly postwar. NeighborhoodScout's Royal Woods profile reports that most homes in the area were built between 1940 and 1969, with a smaller share from 1970 to 1999, and that most residential property is owner-occupied. The individual records match that: the houses in the table below were built between 1957 and 1963.

The lots are what set Royal Woods apart from the Sherman Oaks flats. Redfin's street index puts the average lot on Royal Woods Drive at 13,796 square feet, and the houses in our sample sit on lots from 0.31 to 0.85 acres. That land is the reason buyers pay up here. A 1959 ranch house on a third of an acre can be remodeled, expanded within the hillside rules, or held as is, and the lot keeps its value through all of it.

Condition varies widely, from near-original ranch houses to full rebuilds with pools, so read the permit history before you compare prices.

What the sales and current asks show

Royal Woods does not trade often, and Redfin does not publish a neighborhood market page for it, so the table below is built from individual property records. I included every Royal Woods house I could find with a dated sale on Redfin or Zillow, plus the two houses listed for sale in mid-November 2026. Price per square foot is my own calculation from the square footage on each page.

Tobin Way sits on the same hillside but is not one of the Royal streets, so treat it as a close neighbor rather than a core Royal Woods sale. The 3493 Valley Meadow listing shows 3,311 square feet in the listing and 2,629 finished square feet in public records, a gap worth asking about, since it changes the price per foot from $995 to well over $1,200.

Three things stand out. First, the recorded sales cluster between roughly $610 and $710 per square foot, and both current asks sit well above that band. That does not mean the asks are wrong, since condition and lot size carry a lot of weight here, but it does mean a buyer should ask what has changed in the house since its last sale. Second, 3873 Royal Woods Drive is now offered for lease at $12,900 a month on Redfin, a useful marker for anyone weighing buying against renting in the hills. Third, Redfin's comparable sales for the Valley Meadow house include 2026 closings on nearby hillside streets at $2,300,000 on Castlewoods Drive (June 11), $2,650,000 on Alana Drive (June 12) and $2,850,000 on Tobin Way (July 9). That puts a typical updated house in this part of the 91403 hills somewhere in the mid $2 millions in 2026, with the larger lots and full remodels pushing past $3 million.

This is a small sample, and two of the three recorded sales are from 2025. Use it to frame questions, not to set a price.

If you are weighing a house in Royal Woods against Longridge Estates or the Encino hills, schedule a private consultation about Royal Woods. We can pull every recorded sale on the specific streets you are comparing, check the permit file on the house you like, and get insurance quotes started before you write an offer. You can also browse current inventory on our Los Angeles search page.

Fire zones, permits and insurance

Royal Woods sits on the north slope of the Santa Monica Mountains, so fire hazard mapping is the first thing to check on any address. The State Fire Marshal publishes the Fire Hazard Severity Zone maps, and the City of Los Angeles shows the zone, hillside designation and permit history for each parcel on ZIMAS. Look up the exact parcel rather than assuming the whole hillside is mapped the same way. The zone affects defensible space requirements, what the Natural Hazard Disclosure will show, and how hard it is to place homeowners insurance.

Get an insurance quote on the specific address early in escrow, not after you remove contingencies.

The permit file matters for a second reason. Many Royal Woods houses have been expanded since the 1950s and 1960s, and an addition that was never permitted can complicate both your appraisal and your insurance. Compare the square footage in the listing with public records, as the Valley Meadow listing above shows, and ask the seller to explain any gap.

Transfer tax at closing

Sherman Oaks is part of the City of Los Angeles, so the city's transfer taxes apply. The Office of Finance Measure ULA page lists a base city tax of 0.45% on every sale, and for transactions closing after June 30, 2026, the Measure ULA tax adds 4% above $5,400,000 and 5.5% at $10,900,000 and up. Every sale in the table above sits below the ULA threshold, so only the base city tax applies here. The Los Angeles County documentary transfer tax, listed on the Registrar-Recorder's documentary transfer tax page at $1.10 per $1,000, applies as well.

On a $2,950,000 sale, that works out to about $13,275 in city tax and $3,245 in county tax, roughly $16,520 in total. That is my own arithmetic, and in practice the split between buyer and seller is negotiated, so confirm the final figures with escrow.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Royal Woods in Sherman Oaks? Royal Woods is a hillside section of Sherman Oaks in ZIP code 91403, south of Ventura Boulevard near the Encino line. Its streets include Royal Woods Drive, Royal Meadow Road, Royal Ridge Road and Valley Meadow Road.

How much do houses in Royal Woods sell for? The recorded Royal Woods house sales I could verify ran from $1,700,000 to $2,533,000 in 2025, and the two houses listed in November 2026 ask $2,950,000 and $3,295,000. Nearby 91403 hillside sales in mid 2026 closed between $2.3 million and $2.85 million.

Is Royal Woods the same as Royal Oaks in Encino? No. Royal Oaks is a separate hillside section of Encino. The names are similar and the two areas are close, but a sale in one is not a reliable comp for the other.

Does Measure ULA apply to a home sale in Royal Woods? Only above $5,400,000 for sales closing after June 30, 2026. Below that, the City of Los Angeles base transfer tax of 0.45% and the county tax of $1.10 per $1,000 apply. Confirm the totals with escrow.

How do I find a real estate agent who knows Royal Woods? Look for someone who has closed hillside sales in the Valley and on the Westside, who reads permit files and Natural Hazard Disclosures as a matter of routine, and who can pull recorded sales street by street, since Royal Woods trades too rarely for a neighborhood average to mean much. Paul Blair has 22 years in the business, works hillside sales from the Hollywood Hills across the Westside and into the Valley, and can run those checks on any Royal Woods address you are considering.

After 22 years of Los Angeles transactions, I have learned that in a hillside pocket like Royal Woods the lot is usually the asset and the house is the variable, and the permit file is where you find out which kind of house you are looking at.

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.