San Mateo

Hillsdale

Hillsdale is a family friendly neighborhood with a convenient location to a lot of amenities

The first of David Bohannon’s Hillsdale subdivisions, the Park Western Subdivision embodies a lifestyle adopted by thousands of San Mateoans in the years following World War II. Perhaps a bit more modest than its descendants, the Park Western Subdivision nevertheless became a template for convenient, well-maintained, function suburban living.

Bohannon incorporated economies of scale to keep his prices low. Lumbar was milled on-site at Burleigh Murray’s old bar, at Hacienda Avenue and Hillsdale Boulevard. Work on the 100-home Hillsdale #2 tract was begun shortly after Hillsdale #1 opened to the public.

Homes are modest in size, with two and three bedrooms and between 1,100 and 1,500 square feet of living space. Some homes have been expanded over time and others have been razed, then replaced with much larger, more ornate structures. Original homes are simple in style, with clean, boxy lines and a variety of exterior finishes. Homes in the Hillsdale neighborhood fall into the middle of the San Mateo pricing spectrum, with “original” ranch homes selling for between $1.5 and $1.8 million, and expanded homes fetching more than $2 million on the open market.

The Park Western Subdivision was laid out in a manner typical of its era. Cul-de-sacs dominate the street layout, and the small district includes two parks within its borders. In 1941, shortly after completing the subdivision, the 15,000 square-foot Andrew Williams department store opened on land adjacent to the Park Western Subdivision – the future site of the Hillsdale Shopping Center, which debuted as an open-air “Fashion Park” in 1954.


To view a detailed google map of the Hillsdale neighborhood, click here. The MLS area is 426.

  • 626

    Homes

  • $2.1M

    Median Sale Price

  • $2.2M

    Average Sale Price

Pricing data based on single-family homes

Hillsdale on the Map

Schools & History

History

Perhaps no single person had as large an impact on 1940s and 50s San Mateo as David Bohannon, a residential and commercial developer largely responsible for the city’s explosive wartime and post-war growth. Today the name “Hillsdale” is associated with a high school and a successful shopping center; in 1940, it was the name Bohannon gave to his vision, after a public contest failed to produce a more compelling handle. The Hillsdale neighborhood is also referred to as the Park Western Subdivision. In 1937, Bohannon bought 848 acres of land from Burleigh H. Murray. His aim was to “take care of the forgotten man, the guy in the middle income bracket.” With Hillsdale, Bohannon promised to give him “a custom-built feeling at mass-volume prices.” Initial plans called for 5000 single-family homes priced between $5,000 and $6,000. By the time he was finished, Bohannon had built six separate Hillsdale subdivisions, had completed a 500-unit low-rise apartment complex straddling Hillsdale Boulevard, a train station and, of course, the Hillsdale Shopping Center. But it all started with “Hillsdale #1,” 84 ranch-style single-family homes he called the “Park Western Subdivision.”

Park Western Subdivision real estate set a template for later Hillsdale tracts.

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