Island Forest, Westlake Village: Living Inside North Ranch's Gate

Drive past the Island Forest gate and the street simply ends. Eleven homes on Island Forest Place, three on Island Forest Avenue, a loop of green fairway on nearly every side, and no through traffic at all. It is one of the quietest addresses in North Ranch, and sales here come along only every few years.

Life on a street with no through traffic

The whole enclave is about 21 acres behind one gate, so daily life here is defined by what is missing: no cut through cars, no neighbors across a back fence, no sense of being in a tract. What you get instead is fairway. Listings describe the street as sitting in the middle of the North Ranch golf course, with one home along the sixth fairway and another with more than 260 feet of golf frontage backing to the club's newly transformed Oaks Course.

That setting shapes the rhythm of the day. Mornings are course maintenance and the occasional cart. Evenings are long views across mowed grass and old oaks. It is the kind of place people buy when they want North Ranch privacy at its most literal, on a smaller and more secluded street than other gated North Ranch enclaves such as Emerald Forest or Crescent Oaks.

Fourteen estates, and no two alike

There was no single builder here. The homes went up between 1987 and 1992 as individual custom estates, which is why the range inside the gate is so wide. The two homes marketed recently ran from a five bedroom, roughly 5,100 square foot house to a seven bedroom estate of about 15,000 square feet, with an 8,000 square foot, five bedroom home sitting between them in the record.

Lots run from just under 30,000 square feet to about 78,000, and the median is right around an acre. Deep driveways and multi car garages are the norm, with one home listing ten parking spaces.

The other story is reinvestment. The largest estate spent two and a half years in a down to the studs renovation and emerged in 2023 with new plumbing, closed cell insulation, whole house automation, a generator and a camera system, grown from an original 12,000 square feet. One of the estates was also the longtime home of artist Melanie Taylor Kent, designed originally by a Disney collaborator known for immersive environments. The homes that have not been touched are late 1980s construction, and a buyer should assume original roofs, pools and systems until shown otherwise.

Schools: Conejo Valley Unified from the Westlake Hills side

Island Forest sits inside the City of Thousand Oaks and Ventura County, so it is served by Conejo Valley Unified rather than the Las Virgenes schools that cover the Los Angeles County side of Westlake Village. The assigned path is Westlake Hills Elementary (K to 5, about two miles away), Colina Middle School and Westlake High School.

Middle school assignments in North Ranch are the ones most often misquoted, so if the school matters to you, confirm the assignment directly with the district for the specific address before you write an offer.

Who Island Forest suits

This is a golf and privacy purchase, not a starter estate. The buyer here usually wants a one gate, one street address, direct fairway views, and room to build out a compound without neighbors in sight. It works best for someone planning to stay, because the 14 owner association and the age of the original homes reward people who intend to invest in the property over time.

If you are weighing other gated options in the area, Whitehawk is worth a look. If you want a sense of how this enclave prices against the rest of the city, our Westlake Village home values page is the place to start, and the full list of Westlake Village neighborhoods shows the alternatives.

What to know before you buy here

• Pricing is a judgment call. With 14 homes and very few closings, there is no clean set of comparable sales inside the gate. Values have to be drawn from the broader custom North Ranch market, and recent asking prices have landed well above where homes eventually closed. Do not anchor on the list price.
• Get the association documents early. Dues figures vary from one record to the next, and with only 14 owners, any gate, street or slope repair is split 14 ways. Ask Emmons Company for the budget, reserve study, CC&Rs and a year of minutes, and confirm whether a separate North Ranch master assessment applies.
• Verify lot size from the assessor. Marketing has advertised two to three acres on a lot the county records at under two. Use the official parcel record, not the flyer.
• Golf frontage cuts both ways. Errant balls, early maintenance crews and cart traffic come with the view. Check the CC&Rs for course easement and liability language.
• Club membership is separate. Living next to the fairways does not include North Ranch Country Club privileges; ask the club directly about membership.
• Order an insurance quote before removing contingencies. North Ranch sits in the rolling Conejo hills, and on homes of this size and age the premium is part of the purchase math.
• Know your jurisdiction. The mailing address says Westlake Village, but permits, city fees and services run through the City of Thousand Oaks, and taxes through Ventura County.

Owning in Island Forest

Westlake Village market, latest data

• Median sale price$1.67M
• Change over 12 months+14.9%
• Typical days on market45

Citywide, three months ending May 2026. Westlake Village home values

Our experience here

We sell across this part of the Conejo Valley, including the neighborhoods around Island Forest, and are glad to talk through how it compares.

Get a private valuation (805) 341-6125

Westlake Village home prices, the last five years

Questions people ask about Island Forest