Mapping out tiki in Orange County, Calif. - General Tiki

S SpaceAgeCity Member Orange County, CA Joined: Nov 17, 2002 Posts: 89	S SpaceAgeCity Posted posted on Wed, Jun 20, 2012 11:34 PM Yes, I'll be interested to hear feedback from everyone. Was this Costa Mesa house designed with Polynesian Pop influence or not? Not that facts can be decided by committee, but it will be interesting to get various viewpoints. Also, I don't think a 1965 construction date would negate the possibility of tiki influence. After all, the last gasp of tiki popularity didn't come until the 1970s. And in fact, the real building boom for tiki-styled tract houses in O.C. doesn't seem to reach full speed until 1962 or so. I'm curious also, how you found a construction date for that house. It would be extremely helpful to know a reliable, easy-to-access source for that information. The city assessor "guess-timates" in most cities are often "off" by as much as 10 years. Those dates, in turn, are the ones parroted by real estate agents, Zillow, etc. The only reliably accurate method I've found so far (short of finding tract ads in the old newspapers) is to find the subdivision maps at the County, which give you a "bookend" date. (e.g. The houses had to have been built AFTER the subdivision date, and probably not too long after.) For individual parcels, I sometimes have to resort to using a combination of deeds and County assessment records (year by year) to figure out when the landowner started getting taxed on an improvement (i.e. a building). Luckily, sometimes using old directories or aerial photos can help winnow down the time period and save me some searching. Anyway, if you have a shortcut, please share! Another thing that would be VERY useful would be a list of all the tract numbers (which is how they were recorded) along with the names used to market those tracts. I would be helpful to be able to look up Tract 1274 and find that it was the "Kona Gardens" tract or the "Stardust Tract." That would greatly simplify the process of finding ads and other marketing materials. Somehow, I don't expect to ever find such a list -- especially for the older subdivisions. Chris

Yes, I'll be interested to hear feedback from everyone. Was this Costa Mesa house designed with Polynesian Pop influence or not? Not that facts can be decided by committee, but it will be interesting to get various viewpoints.

Also, I don't think a 1965 construction date would negate the possibility of tiki influence. After all, the last gasp of tiki popularity didn't come until the 1970s. And in fact, the real building boom for tiki-styled tract houses in O.C. doesn't seem to reach full speed until 1962 or so.

I'm curious also, how you found a construction date for that house. It would be extremely helpful to know a reliable, easy-to-access source for that information. The city assessor "guess-timates" in most cities are often "off" by as much as 10 years. Those dates, in turn, are the ones parroted by real estate agents, Zillow, etc. The only reliably accurate method I've found so far (short of finding tract ads in the old newspapers) is to find the subdivision maps at the County, which give you a "bookend" date. (e.g. The houses had to have been built AFTER the subdivision date, and probably not too long after.) For individual parcels, I sometimes have to resort to using a combination of deeds and County assessment records (year by year) to figure out when the landowner started getting taxed on an improvement (i.e. a building). Luckily, sometimes using old directories or aerial photos can help winnow down the time period and save me some searching. Anyway, if you have a shortcut, please share!

Another thing that would be VERY useful would be a list of all the tract numbers (which is how they were recorded) along with the names used to market those tracts. I would be helpful to be able to look up Tract 1274 and find that it was the "Kona Gardens" tract or the "Stardust Tract." That would greatly simplify the process of finding ads and other marketing materials. Somehow, I don't expect to ever find such a list -- especially for the older subdivisions.

Chris

Post #641213 by SpaceAgeCity on Wed, Jun 20, 2012 11:34 PM