There were some wooden houses. The Palisades was founded in the 1920's and we lost at least one historic building built out of wood (The Will Rogers Ranch house).

Stevie Nicks lives in a historic wooden house; she talked about it during the fire aid concert, how the fire department spent extra time saving it because if it had burned, the rest of the neighborhood would have gone.

Most are built with steel and concrete these days, but I suppose a developer could opt for wood for a single case build -- it would probably require special permits, although the permits are less stringent when replacing a house lost in a natural disaster zone. I don't know.

What I've heard is a lot of people talking about hardening the homes -- making them less vulnerable, but lord knows if the money will be there. A lot of homeowners were underinsured.