Homes, condos and land for sale and rent in Menlo Park, CA

In the nineteenth century two Irish immigrants, Dennis J. Oliver and his brother-in-law D. C. McGlynn, purchased a 1,700-acre (6.9 km2) tract of land on the former Rancho de las Pulgas. In the 1850s they erected a gate with a wooden arch bearing the inscription “Menlo Park” at the entrance to their property (now the intersection of Middle Ave and El Camino Real). The word “Menlo” derived from the owners’ former home of Menlo in County Galway, Ireland, and is an Anglicized version of the original Irish name of the place, Mionloch, meaning “middle lake”.
In 1863, the San Francisco and San Jose Rail Road named a nearby station “Menlo Park” after the sign. The 1867 station building still stands on the platform of the current Caltrain station, used by the local Chamber of Commerce. The town of Menlo Park grew up around this station, becoming a popular home for San Francisco businessmen.
A post office arrived in 1870, and the city was incorporated in 1874. The original arch which gave its name to the stations and ultimately the city survived until 1922, when it was destroyed in an automobile accident. The origin of the name of Menlo Park, California (ca 1850) pre-dates any work done by Thomas Edison (ca 1876) in Menlo Park, New Jersey.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 17.4 square miles (45 km2), of which 9.8 square miles (25 km2) is land and 7.6 square miles (20 km2) is water. The total area is 43.79% water. The main street in downtown Menlo Park is Santa Cruz Avenue, with the Menlo Center situated at its intersection with El Camino Real. The Menlo Park Civic Center is bounded by Ravenswood Avenue, Alma Street, Laurel Street and Burgess Drive. It contains the council offices, library, police station and Burgess Park which has various recreational facilities.

Redwood City, along with most of the Bay Area, enjoys a mild Mediterranean climate (Köppen climate classification Csb), with warm, dry summers and cool, relatively wet winters. The National Weather Service, which maintains both a forecast center and a cooperative office in Redwood City, reports that December is the coolest month and July is the warmest month. The record highest temperature of 110 °F (43.3 °C) and was recorded on July 14 and 15, 1972. The record lowest temperature of 16 °F (−8.8 °C) was recorded on January 11, 1949. Annually, there are an average of 21.6 days with highs of 90 °F (32 °C) or higher and 2.8 days with highs of 100 °F (38 °C) or higher; there are an average of 10.4 days with lows of 32 °F (0 °C) or lower.
The normal annual precipitation is 20.56 inches (52.22 cm). The most rainfall in one month was 12.42 inches (31.55 cm) in February 1998. The record 24-hour rainfall of 4.88 inches (12.4 cm) was on October 13, 1962. There are an average of 62.1 days with measurable precipitation. Snow flurries have been observed on rare occasions; there was some minor snow accumulation in May 1935, January 1962, and February 1976.

The 2010 United States Census reported that Menlo Park had a population of 32,026. The population density was 3,271.3 people per square mile (1,263.1/km²). The racial makeup of Menlo Park was 22,494 (70.2%) White, 1,551 (4.8%) African American, 156 (0.5%) Native American, 3,157 (9.9%) Asian, 454 (1.4%) Pacific Islander, 2,776 (8.7%) from other races, and 1,438 (4.5%) from two or more races.
There were 5,902 people (18.4%) of Hispanic or Latino background, of any race. Among the Hispanic population, 4,303 were of Mexican ancestry.

The Census reported that 31,181 people (97.4% of the population) lived in households, 599 (1.9%) lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, and 246 (0.8%) were institutionalized.
There were 12,347 households, out of which 4,112 (33.3%) had children under the age of 18 living in them, 6,163 (49.9%) were opposite-sex married couples living together, 1,039 (8.4%) had a female householder with no husband present, 371 (3.0%) had a male householder with no wife present. There were 642 (5.2%) unmarried opposite-sex partnerships, and 102 (0.8%) same-sex married couples or partnerships. 3,672 households (29.7%) were made up of individuals and 1,371 (11.1%) had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.53. There were 7,573 families (61.3% of all households); the average family size was 3.20.

In terms of age 7,805 residents (24.4%) were under the age of 18, 1,817 people (5.7%) aged 18 to 24, 9,563 people (29.9%) aged 25 to 44, 8,263 people (25.8%) aged 45 to 64, and 4,578 people (14.3%) who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38.7 years. For every 100 females there were 93.7 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 91.5 males.
There were 13,085 housing units at an average density of 1,336.6 per square mile (516.1/km²), of which 6,927 (56.1%) were owner-occupied, and 5,420 (43.9%) were occupied by renters. The homeowner vacancy rate was 1.1%; the rental vacancy rate was 5.2%. 18,972 people (59.2% of the population) lived in owner-occupied housing units and 12,209 people (38.1%) lived in rental housing units.

For primary schools, the central portions of Menlo Park are served by the Menlo Park City School District, while the Belle Haven neighborhood and VA hospital are served by the Ravenswood City School District, and the Sharon Heights and Stanford Hills neighborhoods served by the Las Lomitas Elementary School District. For high school, Menlo Park is part of the Sequoia Union High School District, with all of Menlo Park falling into the boundaries of Menlo-Atherton High School.
Catholic parochial schools are St. Raymond Catholic Elementary School and Nativity Elementary School. Peninsula School is a private progressive primary school. Trinity School is an Episcopalian elementary school. The German-American International School with about 315 students, K-12, is also in the city.
For higher education, Saint Patrick’s Seminary and University is a Catholic seminary in Menlo Park. Fuller Theological Seminary, an evangelical Christian school, has a branch campus in Menlo Park. Menlo College and Menlo School, which is a prep school, despite their names are in neighboring Atherton.
There are two libraries within the city, the Main branch and the Belle Haven branch. These libraries are part of the Peninsula Library System and share many resources with other nearby libraries.

Much of Menlo Park’s economy revolves around the companies on Sand Hill Road, consisting of venture capital, private equity, financial services, law firms, and other professional service companies and investment vehicles focusing on technology. Geron, Robert Half International, Exponent, Sunset and SRI International are among the companies based in Menlo Park.
Facebook moved its headquarters to the former campus of Sun Microsystems in Menlo Park in December 2011.