I was really shocked when I drove to Santa Barbara and saw that stretch along the Pacific Coast Highway. There was barely any work done at all. The Palisades fires stopped almost 1 1/2 years ago. What is going on here?
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It’s a hustle to get the permits. At least that’s what a friend told me. There are new coastal requirements for building so close to the water. On top of that, everything in California seems to be overregulated. Things move forward very slowly.
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Money seems to be a problem as well. Insurances didn’t pay enough to cover a rebuild. People are trying to sell. Imagine what the insurance would cost you. Almost impossible to insure at this point.
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Short answer: it’s Malibu… nothing moves fast there unless it’s a wave. ^^
Longer answer: rebuilding along PCH is kind of a perfect storm, insurance payouts take forever, permits/coastal commission approvals are notoriously slow, and then you’ve got strict environmental and coastal regulations on top of that. Add in high construction costs, labor shortages, and some owners still fighting with insurers or deciding whether to rebuild at all… and yeah, 1.5 years starts to look “normal” (by LA standards anyway).
Basically: it’s not that nothing’s happening, it’s just happening at “Malibu pace”.. 
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That sounds like a lot of work. We might never see a full recovery. Sad to see these ruins instead of houses.