Newbury Park

Egbert Starr Newbury arrived in the 1870s, bought 2,200 acres of old rancho land, and in 1875 became the Conejo Valley's first postmaster — the "park" in the name was his impression of the oak-dotted landscape. Drought bankrupted the Newburys within two years, but the post office name stuck, which is why homes inside Thousand Oaks city limits still carry Newbury Park addresses today.

The community's landmark is the Stagecoach Inn: a grand redwood hotel built in 1876 to serve the coast road, later a church, a school, and a military academy. Moved to save it from the 101 freeway in 1966, it burned in 1970 and was rebuilt as the museum that anchors local history — a National Register site, complete with Chumash artifacts and mammoth fossils dug up nearby. The Borchard family, German immigrants who farmed 4,000 acres here from the 1870s, gave their name to the road and park every resident knows.

Newbury Park grew in three chapters. The 1960s brought Casa Conejo — the community's first planned tract, still an unincorporated county island with its own quirks — and the Janss-era streets near Newbury Road. The 1970s–80s filled the central neighborhoods around Sequoia Middle School and up the hillsides of Ventu Park, where cabin-era lanes climb toward the Los Robles Trail. Then came the big one: Dos Vientos Ranch, approved in 1988 and built out from 1998 through the 2000s — roughly 2,350 homes of Spanish-influenced architecture, parks, and its own K-8 school, wrapped on three sides by permanent open space.

The result is the valley's widest spread of "newer" family housing — and, in Casa Conejo and Ventu Park, two pockets where county jurisdiction and eclectic lots reward a buyer's agent who knows the difference.

Newbury Park is CVUSD territory: neighborhood elementaries (Banyan, Cypress, Maple, Walnut) and Sycamore Canyon K-8 in Dos Vientos feed Sequoia Middle and Newbury Park High. NPHS earned a national spotlight through its cross-country dynasty — the 2021 boys team is widely called the greatest in U.S. high-school history, with multiple national titles either side of it. Beyond the trophies, the practical point for families: the west end offers a complete, well-regarded K-12 path without leaving the community.

At the west end of the community sits Rancho Sierra Vista/Satwiwa, the National Park Service gateway where the Chumash-named bluffs of Boney Mountain rise to 2,828 feet. From there, Big Sycamore Canyon runs about eight miles through Point Mugu State Park straight down to the sand at Sycamore Cove — the classic Conejo Valley bike ride and one of the few places in Southern California where suburb connects to surf entirely through parkland. Closer to home: the Satwiwa Native American Indian Culture Center, waterfall hikes, and the Los Robles Trail linking east toward Westlake Village.

Mostly a ZIP code and a state of mind. Newbury Park (91320) is largely inside the City of Thousand Oaks — same city hall, same police, same CVUSD schools — but the name survives from the 1875 post office, and two pockets (Casa Conejo and Ventu Park) really are different: they're unincorporated Ventura County, with county rather than city services. Prices at the west end have historically run a notch friendlier than comparable Thousand Oaks or Westlake Village homes, with newer stock in Dos Vientos. If that trade appeals to you, this is the community to watch.

The newest part of Newbury Park is Dos Vientos Ranch, the master-planned community in the hills at the west end, built from the late 1990s to the 2010s next to Rancho Sierra Vista and Point Mugu State Park. It is a collection of separate neighborhoods, some gated and some open, with their own plans and associations. The Dos Vientos guide maps all of them.

Most of Newbury Park is open streets. Its gated neighborhoods are mostly in Dos Vientos Ranch, plus a few late-1990s tracts such as Arbor Hills and California Oakbrook. See every gated community in Thousand Oaks and Newbury Park on one map.

Newbury Park backs onto some of the best open space in Southern California. Rancho Sierra Vista/Satwiwa, part of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, is the gateway to Boney Mountain and the trails that drop through Point Mugu State Park to the coast. The Conejo Open Space Conservation Agency manages more than 15,000 acres around Thousand Oaks and Newbury Park, including the Conejo Canyons and the ridges behind Dos Vientos. Each neighborhood guide lists the parks and trailheads closest to it.

The 1960s and 1970s tracts, such as Casa Conejo and Dutch Haven, generally have no homeowners association. Most tracts from the late 1980s on do, and the Dos Vientos neighborhoods have both a master association and a neighborhood association. Each neighborhood guide shows the association fees reported on recent sales.

The 101 runs along the north edge of Newbury Park, east to Thousand Oaks and the San Fernando Valley and west down the Conejo Grade to Camarillo and Ventura. Lynn Road, Borchard Road and Wendy Drive are the main north–south streets.

The neighborhoods that back onto open space, including much of Dos Vientos and the south side of Newbury Park, are in high fire hazard severity zones. Check the CAL FIRE hazard zone for any address and get an insurance quote early in escrow.