Is Serra Mesa a good place to buy near MCAS Miramar?

Serra Mesa is the neighborhood most Miramar families drive past without noticing. It sits on the mesa between the Kearny Mesa business district and the Mission Valley floor, bounded by SR-163 and I-805, and it was built almost entirely in the 1950s and early 1960s as housing for the aerospace and Navy workforce of the era. It has stayed what it was: modest ranch houses, a couple of parks, canyon edges, and a commute to almost everywhere in the city that is shorter than the price suggests.

Who lives here and why

The buyers are mid-grade Marines and sailors who want a detached house close to the station without paying Scripps Ranch prices, dual-military couples splitting Miramar and the bay bases, and civilians who work in Kearny Mesa. The draw is location and quiet: Serra Mesa is central without being on a main road, and the lots — small as they are — are single-family. The trade is the age of everything in the house and the lack of the newer-construction feel that Tierrasanta and Scripps Ranch offer a few minutes north.

The commute

Ten to fifteen minutes to Miramar's main gate: north on SR-163 or I-805 to Miramar Road. Kearny Mesa's employers are five minutes away, Mission Valley is down the hill, and downtown is fifteen minutes on the 163. For a spouse at Naval Base San Diego, the 805 or the 15 to the 32nd Street gates runs twenty to thirty minutes outside the peaks. Serra Mesa is one of the few neighborhoods that is a reasonable commute to every base in the county at once.

Housing stock and what the appraiser sees

Nearly everything here predates 1978, so the lead-based paint condition applies to any peeling or chipping paint inside or out. Original electrical panels and galvanized supply lines are common and get noted when they show problems; end-of-life roofs draw a condition. Room additions and converted garages from the 1970s and 1980s are frequent and the appraiser will ask about permits. Canyon-edge lots along Ruffin Canyon bring brush-clearance and slope notes. The appraisal page covers how conditions get cleared; a termite clearance is standard on California VA purchases.

The condo complexes along Mission Village Drive and the corridors are where the lower price band lives, and each project needs VA approval before a unit can close — the condo answer covers the check. Serra Mesa's tracts are not in a Community Facilities District, so the tax bill is the Proposition 13 base and nothing more.

The loan angle

A full-entitlement buyer here gets a detached house on a VA loan with no down payment and no loan limit, at a price band that mid-grade Miramar BAH with dependents can carry; the BAH-to-payment calculator shows it with the actual tax rate, which is low here relative to the master-planned neighborhoods. A buyer keeping a VA-financed house at the last station is on remaining entitlement, and the second-tier calculation usually works in Serra Mesa without a down payment because the band is moderate for central San Diego. The Miramar base guide compares it against Clairemont and Tierrasanta; California's benefits are on the California page.

Next

• See BAH for MCAS Miramar →
• Compare nearby neighborhoods →

Around MCAS Miramar

• Buying Near MCAS Miramar: The Central San Diego VA Loan Guide
• California Veteran Home Buying Benefits: CalVet and the VA Loan
• Poway
• Rancho Peñasquitos
• Scripps Ranch
• Tierrasanta
• The PCS Home Buying Guide