For many Hollister natives, living and working in the town they
grew up in is becoming less and less feasible.
Hollister – For many Hollister natives, living and working in the town they grew up in is becoming less and less feasible.
Local home prices have been going up quickly and dramatically over the past few years, with the median home price in San Benito County reaching an all-time high of $529,000 at the end of last year. That’s more than double the $206,000 median in 1990, according to that year’s county census. As a result, many Hollister natives have been forced to move out of town against their will just to be able to own their own house.
“We knew what we wanted to spend, and we weren’t going to go over what we wanted to spend,” said Theresa Toledo, who began looking for a home in Hollister last year with her boyfriend, Tony Larios.
Both lived and worked in Hollister, and Toledo had moved here with her family when she was just two years old. But the couple’s options for homes that would fit into their price-range were almost nonexistent, and it soon became clear they’d have to leave their home town.
“You couldn’t find anything for under like $600,000,” she said.
Toledo and others have myriad theories as to what causes this phenomenon of life-long Hollister residents being forced out of town by high housing prices. Some say they’re being displaced by Silicon Valley transplants turning Hollister into a bedroom community with their high incomes.
Others say the sewer moratorium has created a shortage of homes in the growing community and made them a hot commodity. Still more say Hollister companies just don’t offer high enough salaries for their employees to be able to afford to live and work in the same place. But all agree it’s nearly impossible to own a home here without a lot of luck and even more money.
“You could never afford to live here unless you worked two or three jobs,” said Toledo, a 33-year-old human resources administrator. “I was working in San Jose and averaging $22 an hour, but the commute wasn’t worth it. The commute finally got to me after seven or eight years.”
So she and Larios drove 200 miles up to Yuba City and began looking around, considering a move. By August they had relocated to the city between Chico and Sacramento, and by Christmastime they had moved into their new home.
“The house we have here, you couldn’t touch for under $650,000 or $700,000 in Hollister,” Toledo said of her single-story, 1,500 square foot home up north. The house is in a nice neighborhood, has a huge three-car garage, and cost Toledo and Larios only $285,000.
“There’s absolutely nothing I would change about the house structurally. Everything we’ve done is cosmetic,” Toledo.
And now she’s working in Sacramento, making about $4 less than she did back home, and she’s still living comfortably.
But the benefits haven’t necessarily outweighed the sacrifices. Larios is still working in Hollister, staying here to work from Monday through Thursday and going home to Yuba City only on the weekends. And Toledo has left her family and friends in a town three hours away from her new home.
Some others haven’t had to make so drastic a move, but have still been squeezed out of the town they grew up in.
Hollister Native Sandra Avila relocated to Los Banos two years ago when it became clear her single income couldn’t buy her a house here.
“You’d have to have two good incomes to own a house in Hollister, and even then you’d have to give things up. But in Los Banos, you’re fine,” said Avila, who still works and visits her children and grandchildren in Hollister. “I like it in Los Banos. I really, really do. You can get a beautiful home for around $300,000. You could never do that here.”
Los Banos is becoming a popular haven for ex-Hollisterites who can’t afford to buy a home in their own community, she said, and as a result the land prices there have started shooting up as well.
Javana Sammons, who moved to Hollister with her parents in 1976, began looking to buy her own home 20 years later. But no home she would actually want to live in was within her budget. So, in 1996, she bought a home in Los Banos for $102,000.
“The house I bought would have been probably $100,000 more in Hollister,” she said. Now, her home’s value has jumped up to $320,000, she said.
While Sammons said she likes living in Los Banos and doesn’t mind the 50-minute commute each way every day to her job at the county assessor’s office in Hollister, she still wishes she could have stayed.
“Los Banos is nice, but I grew up here,” she said. In addition, Sammons’ mother recently moved in with her and she said there are no services for the elderly in Los Banos, so she’s forced to drive her to Hollister for medical treatment.
Still, she said, she knows the chances of her ever moving back to Hollister are slim. Although she’s been building up equity on her house, it’s probably never going to be enough to move back home, she said.
“If I won the lottery, maybe I could move back,” she said. “But anyone who owns a home here (in Hollister) would have to be working in San Jose or be a doctor.”
Toledo said that was her biggest beef with being forced out of town.
“It’s all these San Jose and Sunnyvale people coming to Hollister basically to sleep. All they do is sleep there and then commute to the Bay Area,” she said. “I have tons of resentment for the people moving in and driving the market up because ideally we should be able to live there (in Hollister) and raise our children there.”
“The prices of houses in Hollister have gone up humongously,” said County Marshal Robert Scattini, who also said the increased home prices have caused rent to go up for tenants all over the city. “I probably serve 10-15 eviction notices a week. And It’s sad, because these people should be here; they were born here. The people who are staying here are probably people who already owned their houses, because the young people, there’s no way they could afford it.”
Still, said Avila, she tries not to think about that.
“Of course I’d love to move back to Hollister. I’ve lived there all my life,” she said. “But I have no regrets. If I lived in Hollister I’d still be paying rent. I’d still be throwing my money away.”
Jessica Quandt covers politics for the Free Lance. Reach her at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or at [email protected].
