Can a struggling city change from a rough area into a thriving one?

Yes. Struggling areas do turn around, and Inglewood is the example we point to. Not long ago Inglewood was widely written off. Then SoFi Stadium, the Rams, and the Clippers' arena development moved in, new businesses followed, and the area transformed. Add the pandemic-era stretch of ultra-low rates lifting demand everywhere, and Inglewood saw dramatic appreciation compared with how it was perceived even 10 or 15 years earlier. Nearby Compton has followed a similar arc. A real turnaround takes a stack of fundamentals arriving together: - People moving in. Migration deepens the buyer pool. - Jobs and services. New employers, better healthcare, real amenities. - Committed development dollars. Builders and investors actually putting money in the ground. When those show up at once, demand to live there climbs and prices follow. Miss those ingredients and a hopeful "up-and-coming" story usually stays a story. The catch is time. This kind of change plays out over years and is genuinely hard to time. Buying early in a real transformation can work out very well, and plenty of "next big neighborhood" bets never get the jobs and investment that would make them pay off. We can't promise any specific area is the next Inglewood. Watch for the actual drivers before you count on the turnaround.