Assumption Parish

Nestled right up against Highway 580, Assumption Parish is a nice older neighborhood with lots of older homes and quiet tree lined streets. It is the kind of neighborhood that has a nice open field with lawns and hedges well-trimmed for the most part and lots of signs that residents care for their homes. It is a middle class neighborhood—about average for California and slightly below average for the expensive Bay Area.

Generally speaking the oldest homes in the neighborhood are on the far western end (you will even find a smattering of WWI era homes in this section) and neighborhood gets newer as you head east, with the newest homes dating back to the post WWII era. Of course, this means a lot of Ranch homes in the area—most dating from the late 40’s and mostly well-kept. They are small but nice.

This is partly reflected in the home sale prices for Assumption Parish whose median is around $325K—slightly higher than average for San Leandro. Homes here top out at just under half a million dollars.

One of the drawbacks to the area is the public school system, which although not terrible and certainly much better than Oakland to the north, is still slightly below average generally. Bancroft Middle school is especially bad, if test scores are an accurate reflection of the school environment (which I grant they may not be), while San Leandro High is solid but not great.
So if you have younger kids I wouldn’t recommend this neighborhood.

As to crime, which is about average with the nation in San Leandro generally—here in Assumption Parish things are a little safer than average, with most of the violent crime isolated to the area around 14th Street, where you get about 1 assault per month. Overall I would say this neighborhood is pretty safe, especially relative to the highly dangerous Oakland neighborhoods you encounter not far north of here.

Assumption Parish in specific and San Leandro in general are also well placed for commuters. From Assumption Parish, with a car you can make it as far south as the edge of San Jose, as far north west as the eastern portion of SF, as far north as Pinole and Pleasant Hill and as far east as Livermore all within one hour. Using only public transportation, you can still make to Fremont, eastern SF, San Mateo and San Pablo on the north and Dublin on the east within 1 hour. Basically it is one of the best spots from which to start your morning commute.

It is also adjacent to Old San Leandro—so you can definitely have some restaurants that you can frequent should you choose to.

Overall, this is a pretty good neighborhood for working couples either without kids or with kids high school age and above—that’s for whom I would recommend Assumption Parish.