LA fires destroyed neighborhoods. When can residents come home?

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Nearly all the houses on this street burned down last year. Owners are struggling to return.

ALTADENA, CA – The smoky stench still lingers here on this stretch of Loma Alta Drive.

A year after deadly wildfires rampaged through this once-vibrant road of colorful houses, the scars on the landscape and the struggles for residents remain.

The Jan. 7, 2025, fires killed more than 30 people, scorched 37,000 acres, or almost 58 square miles, across three weeks of fury. The economic impact is estimated to be between $95 billion and $164 billion.

Few have rebuilt houses. The battles with insurance companies persist, as do the bureaucratic hurdles to rebuilding. More than 70% of Eaton and Palisades residents remain displaced by the fires, and many worry about how they’ll financially make it this next year.

But a certain optimism endures. On a recent December day, faint sounds of construction buzzed in the distance. And then laughter, as a group of neighbors who lost their homes in the Eaton Fire slowly arrived to survey their property.

A few residents like Ted Koerner are giving their neighbors hope. Koerner was the first Altadena resident to rebuild and as he sits in his new house, he hopes others will come back soon.

“I don’t know if many of us wanted to know how to build a house, but we have to now,” he said. “We have no choice.”

Although they run into each other at public events in Altadena, these neighbors now live in surrounding towns as they navigate the rebuilding process. They are all still suffering, both emotionally and financially.

Some hope to be in their new homes in 2026. Others, no later than the end of 2027.

They would be back faster, but most are still waiting for their home insurance claims check, contemplating whether to hire a lawyer to sue the local utility company, or taking the company’s pay package, which critics say is insufficient. 

Meanwhile, California Gov. Gavin Newsom continues to push for wildfire-related legislation and pester the Trump administration and Congress to release nearly $34 billion in federal disaster aid ‒ relief he requested nearly a year ago.  

In the Eaton and Palisades fire burn zones, only about a half-dozen homes have been rebuilt so far on the more than 9,000 lots. More are on the way, local officials say, but it’s been slow.

Los Angeles County had approved more than 1,100 rebuilding permits as of Jan. 5, out of 2,900 received, according to county records. Most property owners in Altadena – including three of Koerner’s neighbors on Loma Alta Drive – have yet to submit their applications.  

“This is an arduous process, no question about it,” said Mark Mariscal, a Koerner neighbor who managed to submit his applications in December.

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‘Make sure we have what we need’

Mariscal and his wife, Paula, residents of Altadena since 1989, are navigating the rebuilding with their adult daughter and two grandkids, who live with them. 

Like many survivors of the Eaton and Palisades wildfires, Mariscal expected more federal disaster funds and state assistance. But with the stalemate in Washington, Mariscal, a retired Los Angeles parks and recreation executive, has had to take an aggressive approach regarding their financial needs. 

Mariscal said it will cost about $1.2 million to rebuild the family’s three-bedroom, two-bath home on Loma Alta Drive. He went back and forth with four different insurance adjusters to ensure he would receive what he was due.

“I haven’t been afraid to go back and say, ‘Hey, you’re missing this and that, and if you don’t make these changes, we’re going to file a (legal) claim,’” Mariscal said. “I hope we don’t have to sue, but it’s my goal to make sure we have what we need.”

He, like others in the neighborhood, benefited from GoFundMe.org’s Wildfire Relief Fund, which provided more than $8 million in direct cash grants for 7,500 people affected by the wildfires.

Still, Mariscal expects to have to contribute about $200,000 of his own money to rebuild the house, which he hopes to complete by the end of next year.

The week before Christmas, Mariscal provided an update at the monthly meeting of the Eaton Fire Collaborative, a group working to help Altadena residents. Members responded to his success with cheers.

He urged them all to remain vigilant about their rights.

“We feel comfortable that we can move forward. We can breathe a bit,” Mariscal said later. “Unfortunately, that’s just still not the case for everybody. I want to help as many people as I possibly can.” 

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Digging into savings, taking on debt

Andrew Wessels was luckier than some. His Altadena home is still standing. Still, smoke caused so much damage, his family of four, including two school-age kids, was forced to relocate.

Wessels, strategy director for the Eaton Fire Survivors Network, a grassroots group of more than 10,000, said he has about $40,000 in debt from fire-related expenses and his family has moved a dozen times since the disaster.

Most of his neighbors are in similar situations.

Fire survivors are digging into their savings and taking on debt. More than half have less than a year left of temporary housing funds from their insurance coverage, if they had any at all. One in three households may have to move again by spring when their remaining housing funds run out.

Nearly a quarter of survivors with incomes under $100,000 have had to cut back on buying food, and 15% have had to forego medical care, according to a report by the nonprofit Department of Angels, which supports wildfire victims.

Many survivors, like Wessels, have to pay both rent for their temporary housing as well as a mortgage ‒ often on a house that no longer exists.

In December, Wessels, the survivors’ network, and other organizations held a news conference to again ask Southern California Edison, the local electric utility, to provide immediate housing assistance for fire survivors. 

SoCal Edison has not admitted fault, but has acknowledged the possibility that its equipment could be associated with the wildfire sparked in Eaton Canyon.

“We still don’t know whether Edison equipment caused the Eaton fire,” Edison International CEO Pedro Pizarro told the Los Angeles Times in April. “It’s certainly possible it did,” he said, adding that climate change might have played a role in the fire’s intensity.

Pizarro has made clear the utility would not provide fire victims any money unless they agreed not to sue. He said SoCal Edison created its Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program in July to get survivors their money faster than if they filed a lawsuit and waited for a settlement.

But Wessels, who cowrote a 51-page report, “Fix What You Broke,” is critical of Edison’s compensation program and believes the utility can do more to step up. 

A state fund established to protect utilities should help refund any money the utility fronts to homeowners, he said.

“The purpose of the fund is to make sure the utilities remain solvent in case there is a catastrophe,” Wessels told USA TODAY. “Edison would get reimbursed, but it appears they don’t want to carry this kind of debt.”  

Wessels said the Eaton Fire Survivor’s Network has a simple proposal: Keep survivors safely housed until they can go home. Advance interim housing support through the same “pay now, reconcile later approach,” the state’s other investor-owned utilities have used, and let the wildfire fund reimburse them later (though ratepayers would likely be required to make up the cost eventually). 

“We’re not asking charity or for a blank check,” Wessels said during a recent news conference. “We’re asking Edison to fix what it broke, starting with ensuring that every survivor has stable housing, that no survivor is pushed into homelessness.”

‘We lost everything’

For musician Rasheed Ali and his wife, photographer and retired school teacher Gayle Nicholls-Ali, the flashbacks began to strike more often as Jan. 7, 2026, approached.

The couple was celebrating their 43rd wedding anniversary in the Bahamas a year ago when they learned their neighborhood was on fire.

Hours later, their son Kareem sent a video showing their home of 30 years reduced to rubble, as smoke spread in the background. “Mom, Dad, it’s all gone,” he told them. 

Without any place to stay, the couple, remained in the Bahamas for two more months. The house, two vehicles, and artwork were gone, along with Ali’s homemade recording studio, several instruments, and the master recordings of his 10 albums; so too were Nicholls-Ali’s hard drives and countless images. 

“We lost everything,” she said.

“We lost all connection to our artistry, that’s worse than even losing the house,” Ali added. “The house can be rebuilt, but our works, our efforts, are all gone.” 

Revisiting their lot 10 days before Christmas, the couple said they fully intend to rebuild, hoping to enter their new home by Christmas 2026.

Despite two generous GoFundMe accounts and receiving about 80% of their home insurance claim, they are still a couple of hundred thousand dollars short of what they need.

They are hoping a legal settlement with SoCal Edison and some grants and loans will help offset their rebuilding costs.

They are grateful for neighbors like Mariscal, who have shared tips for dealing with home insurers, submitting rebuild permits, and searching for contractors and builders within their budget. 

“On our Facebook and WhatsApp group chats, they constantly say you have to be a pain in their asses,” Nicholls-Ali said. 

“Oh, we can do that. No problem,” Ali said. “It’s like playing a poker game, we’re putting all of our chips across the table for our rebuild. … We need every dollar that’s owed. Don’t play with us.”

Harder than being persistent, though, is coping with the emotional toll ‒ the loss, the grief, the worry.

“We know that some of our neighbors and friends are still grappling with what happened and not ready to move forward,” Nicholls-Ali said. “Yes, it’s very traumatic, but we simply don’t have that luxury to wait.”

Ali said volunteering at neighborhood food and clothing giveaways helps him cope.

“Don’t get me wrong. I do get depressed, and a lot of times those days volunteering when I feel down are what really drives me,” Ali said. “We pick ourselves up by giving back.” 

‘Will we get our Altadena back?’

Because he works in Altadena, Boon Lim constantly sees the burned-out remnants of his old neighborhood along with those small, hopeful signs of construction.

Surveying his property recently, Lim envisioned what his rebuilt home might look like. A bigger open kitchen? Maybe a garage instead of a carport? 

But he’s not ready to make a decision yet. An engineer at Blue Origin, Lim and his wife, Heather, an engineering development technician at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, are OK with proceeding slowly. They’d rather stay in temporary housing for another year than make a rebuilding decision they’ll regret later.

Lim, 48, said the family is concentrating first on regaining their emotional equilibrium after all they’ve been through.

“My focus is on my family, making sure everything is settled,” said Lim, father to daughter Persephone, 19, and sons Bowen, 7, and Neo, 4. “This has taken a huge mental toll on us, on everybody.”

To take care of himself, Lim joined a biweekly men’s healing circle called DENA Heals.

“It’s a good opportunity to talk about the bonding, the restrengthening of ourselves, our families, and communities,” Lim said. “Everything from our homes, our minds, and our hearts.” 

His family, like many others, also volunteers. They understand what it’s like to be in need. In the past year, Lim said, “everybody has gone from one side of the line to the other, from accepting help to giving help.”

That’s what Altadena and Loma Alta Drive were like before the fire, he said. Neighbors would help neighbors. Diversity was their strength. Everybody assumed the best of everyone else.

Lim worries such neighborliness won’t be rebuilt along with the houses. Developers are swoopingin to purchase vacant lots or buy from homeowners who may not want, or can’t afford to rebuild.

“One of our real concerns is what our communities are going to look like? Will we maintain some of our unique character, our charm?” Lim said. “That’s also on a lot of our minds. Will we get our Altadena back?”

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Doing it for Daisy May

On a recent day, gazing out at the sunset from his new home, Koerner acknowledged that he’s extremely lucky to already be back on Loma Alta Drive.

His newly rebuilt 2,160-square-foot, single-story, three-bedroom, two-bath home, complete with a patio and an attached garage, looms large amid the ruins along this stretch of road. 

The house was built in just four months, marking the first full rebuild in Altadena since the fire. Koerner, 67, was determined to have Daisy May, his beloved 13-year-old golden retriever, under a new roof for the 2025 holidays.

“I owed it to her. Those days of staying in a hotel, then a rental home after the fire were hard, especially when your dog is going on 14,” Koener said. “She is the sole justification for why we built so fast. Every day is precious, especially for her.”

So, Koerner, a former executive at a fraud prevention company, used nearly $700,000 of his retirement fund to start construction. He believes that after insurance payments, he’ll be set back “a few hundred thousand dollars.” 

He received his rebuilding permits in nine weeks, hounding Los Angeles County, letting them know his contractors were ready to start. No more excuses. No more runarounds.

“I’m not married, I have no children,” Koerner said, rubbing Daisy May’s head as the sun peeked inside the home. “I’m deeply and firmly attached to my dog and grateful to live in this space.”

On Dec. 4, 2025, Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger and other officials presented Koerner with a certificate of occupancy during a ceremony outside his home, flanked by media and other fire survivors.

Mariscal, who lived down the road from Koerner and attended the ceremony, marveled at his neighbor’s resolve ‒ and willingness to take a financial risk. “He had the means and the motivation,” Mariscal said. “His house allows us to dream about the possibilities.”

For his part, Koerner said he’s happy to be back. But it’s sometimes hard to be the trailblazer, the first one to return to a neighborhood that has been the site of so much tragedy.

“I’m sorry that a lot, so many people are suffering,” Koerner said a little more than a week after moving in, choking up as Daisy May scampered across the front lawn. “I drive down the street, and I get so excited when I see framing for a new house go up, and then the next 15 blocks are deserted, and weeds are popping up on their properties.

“So my emotions go up and down, up and down very quickly,” Koerner said, wiping a tear. “It’s still a process. For all of us.”