Santa Clarita highlight
Master-planned community with Cowboy Festival
Valencia is a master-planned community developed starting in the 1960s by Newhall Land and Farming Company, built on land where the company had ranched and farmed, with deep historical ties to the American West.
Valencia began as a planned development in the 1960s when the Newhall Land and Farming Company, which had ranched and farmed the area since earlier decades, conceived a master-planned community for the Santa Clarita Valley. The name itself honors the Valencia orange, a crop that was grown there. The company designed a comprehensive development with residential neighborhoods, commercial centers including Valencia Town Center, and industrial and commerce parks that would attract major employers to the area. The most recent phase, the Great Park development, was conceived in the 1980s and broke ground in 2017 after environmental and financing challenges.
Valencia's neighbor Newhall carries deeper historical weight: it is the oldest and southernmost community in Santa Clarita and the site of the William S. Hart Museum. Hart was the foremost Western star of the silent film era, most prominent from 1915 through his final film Tumbleweeds in 1925, and a consistent money-making star for the studios. His 260-acre former estate in Newhall operates as a public museum and park, preserving both his personal history and the broader era of Western filmmaking centered in the Santa Clarita Valley. The area's entertainment legacy is also marked by Old Town Newhall's Walk of Western Stars.
For Santa Clarita families planning financial futures, the area's dual character—modern planned neighborhoods and historic Western roots—reflects a household balancing act. A home in Valencia's planned community or Newhall's historic neighborhoods, a career in film or in the corporate parks, children in growing schools—these are the circumstances that make term life coverage practical. A 20- or 30-year policy sized to a family's real financial obligations covers the horizon when both income and protection matter most.