At Lake Arrowhead, a deed becomes a boat decal. Only Association members who own Arrowhead Woods property may launch; every boat without an intact ALA band must be decontaminated before launching, and members pledge that their lake gear will be used on no other water. Members and guests may paddle after the operator test, but a renter may not run the owner's boat. The Association owns the bed and governs recreation; the water district holds the right to drink from it. After drought dropped the lake, a 2006 state order cut district withdrawals by more than 40 percent, to 1,566 acre-feet a year. The district and Association set a 5,100-foot target. On summer holidays daily demand can jump from 2.3 million gallons to six. Replacement water is pumped nearly 2,000 feet uphill to Crestline in place of lake water. On August 24, 2026, the surface stood 1.76 feet below full and measured 73.9 degrees. Just north of it, the 2007 Grass Valley Fire moved house to house on lofted embers, leaving green trees beside burned homes.
curator · lake-level · as of Sep 3, 2026
The facts
- Surface area 3 km² usgs-3dhp · lake-level · as of Jun 2, 2026
- Nearest town Lake Arrowhead · 0.1 km osm-overpass · lake-level · as of Jun 2, 2026
- Bird species (within 25 mi) 218 ebird-api-v2 · lake-level · as of Jun 2, 2026
- Bird diversity index 0.88 ebird-api-v2 · lake-level · as of Jun 2, 2026
- Median home value $514,500 census-acs-2024-b25077 · block-group-level · as of Jun 2, 2026
- Water clarity Moderate curator · lake-level · as of Sep 3, 2026
- Night sky Dark skies viirs-black-marble-vnp46a4 · lake-level · as of Sep 3, 2026
- Surroundings Resort — a shoreline built for visitors curator · lake-level · as of Sep 3, 2026
- Water origin Reservoir curator · lake-level · as of Sep 3, 2026
In more detail
- Climate
- four-season; cool winters (~37°F mean), mild summers (~67°F); ~38 in precip/yr noaa-normals-1991-2020-descriptor · lake-level · as of Jun 2, 2026
- Public access
- Private community lake — no general-public access: recreation on the water is controlled by the Arrowhead Lake Association, with lake-use privileges tied to qualifying Arrowhead Woods property ownership plus authorized guests and tenants. Access comes with the community rather than through a public gate: owning or renting qualifying Arrowhead Woods property is the access model (launch-roster exception per pp-chg.13 — presented explicitly as a private-community lake). Fees/permits: ALA membership, property-qualified. Sources: ala-ca.org types of membership (fetched 2026-07-19). curator · lake-level · as of Jul 19, 2026
- Property tax
- 0.70% ACS effective-rate proxy (2024 ACS 5-year; San Bernardino County anchor: $3,538 median real-estate taxes paid ÷ $505,000 median owner-occupied home value; California proxy 0.70%, +0.00 percentage points). census-acs-2024-property-tax · county-level · as of Dec 31, 2024
Where it’s heading
Stable hand-rated for v0.1 · lake-level · as of Sep 3, 2026
Stable by the mini-pass criterion — a mature, built-out second-home market with growth capped by water, not a growth vector: new water connections averaged under one percent a year 1995–2009 and have been limited to five per month since Ordinance 65 (June 2006) because the district "does not have adequate water supplies" after the 40% cut (LAFCO 2010); 56.4% of housing units vacant at the 2020 census (NeighborhoodScout 61.6%); price line flat — one-year appreciation +1.43% (NeighborhoodScout, Q4 2025, "lower than … most communities in America") after +47.59% over five; the county's STR regime has tightened since the June 2022 urgency ordinance (new permit $1,144 from July 2025, no cap fetched). Hedges: population figures span three geographies (12,401 / 10,639 / 7,714 — Spread 5) and no permit-velocity series was fetched; the 2025–26 state valve/dewatering demand is a condition of the dam, not a trajectory.