MLS Downtown Mountain View, Real Estate in Mountain View, CA
“The neighborhood of Downtown Mountain View is the heart and soul of the city, offering a historic yet lively atmosphere and a multitude of housing options at varying price points.”
The borough of Downtown Mountain View (MLS #207) is the geographic and historic epicenter of the city and where it continues to thrive. An impressive display of architectural styles abounds, including Arts & Crafts, Victorian, and the Mediterranean, as well as new luxury condominiums, offering exceptional variety in both price and style of home.
In 1990s, Castro Street, which bisects the Downtown district, was transformed from lackluster to a shining star. Boasting some of the best restaurants in the Silicon Valley along with coffee shops, cafes, and unique shops, Castro Street attracts high-end buyers to this flourishing, family-friendly borough.
The decades-old district is made up of Shoreline West and Old Mountain View. Prior to 1994, this borough was a single area. The Shoreline West Neighborhood Association changed all that by implementing new boundaries, enabling more direct control over their neighborhood’s historic preservation.
Old Mountain View has an atmosphere akin to Menlo Park’s Allied Arts or Redwood City’s Mount Carmel neighborhood. Verdant archways and immaculate century-old homes line its streets. Old Mountain View residents also enjoy a multitude of parks and proximity to Castro Street, the city’s vibrant commercial and entertainment hub. This well-established borough offers a lifestyle brimming with neighborhood events, history, and prosperity.
With homes ranging from craftsman to Victorian to duplexes and apartments, Shoreline West offers greater housing diversity and as such, a bit more affordability, with prices starting at about $399,000 and moving upward. The borough offers quiet, tree-lined streets leading to small neighborhood markets and shops. Its residents include young families as well as long-time inhabitants, all of who seem to know each other by name, thanks to organized neighborhood events. Shoreline West residents enjoy the picnic and playgrounds, athletic courts, and fields in the neighborhood’s centrally-located Castro Park.
With its growth, historic preservation, and community togetherness, this classic borough is a perfect blend of the All-American neighborhood.
Favorable Attributes
- Prosperous historic and geographic center of Mountain View
- Within walking distance to vibrant downtown shopping district
- Multitude of local parks and small neighborhood markets
- Exceptional variety in housing options, styles and prices
- Flourishing, family-friendly “All American” neighborhood
History of Downtown Mountain View
Before the 1950s, Downtown Mountain View was the extent of the city itself. Surrounding this neighborhoods were fields and fruit orchards.
The original downtown was shaped around El Camino Real during the mid-19th century. In 1864, when railroad tracks were laid a mile north of the El Camino, a new downtown was born with Castro Street at its core. Over time, residential streets encompassed Castro, and the Downtown Mountain View borough was formed.
Shoreline West can be traced to 1904 and the relocation of Oakland’s Pacific Press Seventh-Day Adventist Publishing Company to the district, which brought with it an influx of Adventist families. They constructed a 60,000-square-foot facility, which remained open until 1983 when the business moved its operations to Idaho.
Before Pacific Press made its move to the area, Shoreline West was dotted with impressive estates on large plots of land. Over time, rather than becoming a borough of mansions, it became a neighborhood of modest homes.
Mountain View’s revival of its downtown shopping center in the 1990s has placed the borough of Downtown Mountain View