My Neighborhoods: Portola Valley

Since I grew up in Portola Valley and our first video is about PV, thought I would do a quick overview…

Regards,

Nino

Portola Valley is a somewhat small city located in the state of California. With a population of 6,714 people and two constituent neighborhoods, Portola Valley is the 491st largest community in California.

Portola Valley home prices are not only among the most expensive in California, but Portola Valley real estate also consistently ranks among the most expensive in America.

Portola Valley is a decidedly white-collar city, with fully 97.03% of the workforce employed in white-collar jobs, well above the national average. Overall, Portola Valley is a city of professionals, managers and sales and office workers. There are especially a lot of people living in Portola Valley who work in management occupations (24.46%), sales jobs (10.06%) and business and financial occupations (9.55%).

And if you like science, one thing you’ll find is that Portola Valley has lots of scientists living in town – whether they be life scientists, physical scientists (like astronomers), or social scientists (like geographers!). So, if you’re scientific-minded, you might like it here too.

Also of interest is that Portola Valley has more people living here who work in computers and math than 95% of the places in the US.

Of important note, Portola Valley is also a city of artists. Portola Valley has more artists, designers and people working in media than 90% of the communities in America. This concentration of artists helps shape Portola Valley’s character.

One interesting thing about the economy is that relatively large numbers of people worked from their home: 11.78% of the workforce. While this number may seem small overall, as a fraction of the total workforce this is high compared to the rest of the county. These workers are often telecommuters who work in knowledge-based, white-collar professions. For example, Silicon Valley has large numbers of people who telecommute. Other at-home workers may be self-employed people who operate small businesses out of their homes.

In addition, Portola Valley is home to many people who could be described as “urban sophisticates”. Urban sophisticates are educated, wealthy, executives and professionals, who have urbane tastes in books, food, and travel, whether they actually live in a big city, or choose to reside in a small town. In big or medium-sized cities, urban sophisticates tend to frequent art institutions such as opera, symphonies, ballet, live theatre, and museums.

Because of many things, Portola Valley is a great place for families with children to consider. First of all, many other families with children live here, making Portola Valley a place where both parents and children are more likely to develop social ties with other families, as well as find family-oriented services and community. The city’s good public school district and large population of college-educated adults provide an environment conducive to academic values. With regard to real estate, Portola Valley has a high rate of owner-occupied single family homes, which tends to reflect stability in the local community. Finally, Portola Valley’s overall crime rate is lower than average for the country.

Being a small city, Portola Valley does not have a public transit system used by locals to get to and from work.

Portola Valley Information and Demographics

Do you like to read, write and learn? If you move to Portola Valley, you’ll likely find that many of your neighbors like to as well. Portola Valley is one of the more educated communities in America, with a full 80.59% of its adults having a college degree or even advanced degree, compared to a national average across all communities of 19.23%.

The per capita income in Portola Valley in 2000 was $96,373, which is wealthy relative to California and the nation. This equates to an annual income of $385,492 for a family of four.

The people who call Portola Valley home describe themselves as belonging to a variety of racial and ethnic groups. The greatest number of Portola Valley residents report their race to be White, followed by Asian. Important ancestries of people in Portola Valley include English, German, European, Irish, Italian and French.