COURTYARD DESIGN ON COMEBACK.

Byline: Naush Boghossian Staff Writer

VALENCIA - Courtyard homes, popular in Los Angeles in the 1920s, are staging a revival in Valencia, where developers find they can build more houses on less land and buyers can save some money.

The concept of courtyard homes - a cluster of houses built around a common yard - inspired the design of the Carmelita homes off Goldcrest Drive in Valencia.

Four homes, each with a different floor plan, surround a landscaped entry promenade that provides a private courtyard for the houses.

Courtyard homes are not new to Valencia. Houses in this design first appeared in 1996 in the North Park community called The CourtHome Collection, followed by the Mayfair in 1998 in the same neighborhood. The single-family homes in Carmelita differ from their earlier counterparts because they are larger, ranging from 1,537 to 2,252 square feet.

The concept has found success in Valencia because it appeals to both buyers and developers.

Eric Zuziak, a partner in JBZ Architecture and Planning, the firm that designed Carmelita, explained that the design allows for a maximum number of homes to be built on smaller lots, still providing privacy for the residents.

``This is a very land-efficient concept that yields a fairly high density of homes in a livable way,'' said Zuziak, whose firm won several prizes for efficient design for Carmelita.

The homes are an alternative to town houses and condominiums, but homes don't share common walls. At Carmelita, the homes are 10 feet apart at the closest point.

``It's not any different from living in a town house but you don't have a common wall. It's like you're living in a house,'' said Debbie Davis, who said she and her husband decided to buy one of the cluster homes because they would have access to a recreation center with a pool and tennis and basketball courts, and because it is centrally located in Valencia.

The homes start in the low $300,000s, in the same price range as some new Valencia town houses.

Remax real-estate agent Mike Hrezo said comparably sized town houses in Valencia that offer the same amenities as Carmelita cost roughly the same, but the homes are attached.

Jessica Fabricant, marketing manager for Taylor Woodrow who developed Carmelita, said the company's studies indicated Valencia was an ideal marketplace for the courtyard home design.

``We found that there were many people in Valencia that wanted to move a step up from an apartment or a town house and live in a detached home, but without facing a significant price jump,'' she said.

Zuziak said the disadvantage of courtyard homes is that they are not as private as traditional single-family homes.

The concept of a detached house at town house prices appears to be working - the homes are selling at a brisk pace, with the smallest model already sold out.

Developers like the design because they can put more houses on smaller lots, increasing profits.

Marlee Lauffer, spokeswoman for The Newhall Land and Farming Company, which sold the land to Taylor Woodrow for development, said the high price of land in Southern California factors into design decisions.

``As in all of Southern California, the price of the land is driving up the cost of the house,'' Lauffer said. ``The common courtyard allows the developers to reduce the prices of these single-family homes.''

``We wanted a cluster design, but we wanted to make it different so it wouldn't feel as dense as other courtyard homes,'' Fabricant said.

The neighborhood is made up of 85 homes on 12.4 acres - part of the larger 185-acre Woodlands community.

With so many homes built in close proximity to one another, the developers felt the design would encourage neighbors to socialize.

But at Carmelita, residents say chats with neighbors are infrequent.

``I don't see my neighbors at all,'' said Davis, who lives in the largest home of the Carmelita plan. ``Only on weekends, people come out and water their yards.''

Carmelita sales agent Mary Flores said, ``You don't have to see your neighbor if you don't go out of your way to do it.''

Courtyard homes were in their heyday in the 1920s and 1930s in Los Angeles. There are two common versions of the concept: Like Carmelita, the front doors of the homes face a landscaped yard, or the common courtyard serves as a driveway to individual garages.

Zuziak said the concept has become popular again during the past two to three years.

With the Carmelita clusters, the courtyards are landscaped and the garage doors face alleys. Each home has private access through the garage. In fact, the design departs from the traditional design of courtyard homes because the two houses in the front face the street. Just the two houses in the rear of each cluster face the courtyard.

In addition to Valencia, cluster homes are in development in different areas of Orange County, including Irvine and Ladera.

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Designers of the Carmelita tract in Valencia clustered four detached homes around a common courtyard to maximize land efficiency.

Shaun Dyer/Special to the Daily News