Sunshine Sober Living is a family-owned structured sober living residence in Tarzana, about nine miles east of Calabasas by way of US-101. The house welcomes men and women aged 21 and older who are committed to long-term recovery, and it pairs a substance-free home with curfews, drug testing, house meetings and support for work, school and outpatient care.
Calabasas is an incorporated city rather than a Los Angeles neighborhood, with its own library on Civic Center Way and its own shuttle and trolley service. Residents who come to Sunshine from here travel east, and the run along US-101 to Tarzana takes fifteen to twenty-two minutes in normal traffic. Nine miles is far enough to leave the old streets behind, close enough for Sunday dinner at home.
The house takes men and women aged twenty-one and older, including people managing co-occurring conditions. Some arrive after residential treatment, some after a medically supervised detox, some from a spare room where nothing was working any more. What they share is a substance-free address, a schedule, and the company of other people doing the same work. Sunshine Sober Living has served the recovery community since 2019.
Calabasas has no acute-care hospital inside its city limits, so families planning care for someone in early recovery are already driving out of the city to get it.
People searching for sober living in Calabasas are usually looking for one plain thing: a place to sleep where drinking and using are not on the menu. Sunshine is structured sober living, not a hospital and not a rehab. Nobody prescribes medication here and nobody runs therapy groups. The house provides a substance-free home in Tarzana, rules that hold, staff who notice when something is off, and a shape to the week.
It is built for adults twenty-one and over who want long-term recovery, men and women alike, including people living with anxiety, depression or other conditions alongside a substance use disorder. Residents keep their jobs, their classes, their therapists and their families. Independence gets rebuilt rather than paused, one ordinary week at a time. The way the house is organized sets out what that looks like from Monday morning onward.
The Calabasas Group meets at Church in the Canyon, 4235 Las Virgenes Road, on Tuesday evenings, an open discussion meeting listed by the San Fernando Valley AA Central Office. Just east of the city line, the Motion Picture and Television Fund campus at 23388 Mulholland Drive hosts a Calabasas beginners discussion meeting on Friday evenings. Residents who move to Tarzana often keep going to both, driving back the way they came.
Those two evenings matter more than they look. In an eighteen-month study of 245 sober living residents, involvement in twelve-step groups predicted nearly every outcome the researchers measured. Meetings are treated here as part of the week rather than an optional extra, which is also why sharing a house with other people in recovery does work that a quiet private rental cannot.
The shape of the week is simple and it does not bend with anyone’s mood. Residents get up, get out, and come back before curfew. Drug and alcohol testing is part of ordinary life here, house meetings happen on a set evening, chores rotate, and everyone is expected to be doing something with their days: work, school, outpatient treatment or an honest search for one of them. Structure is not punishment.
What the house asks of every resident, from the first night onward:
There is no Metro G Line station in Calabasas. Metro Line 161 is the main fixed route through the city, running from Thousand Oaks through Agoura Hills and Calabasas to Warner Center, where the G Line starts its run east across the San Fernando Valley. The City of Calabasas also operates its own shuttle and trolley services, and Chatsworth is the nearest Metrolink station.
Plenty of people do. The Agoura Road office corridor beside US-101 holds the headquarters of Harbor Freight Tools, The Cheesecake Factory and DTS, and the drive back out to them is the same nine miles. Students at Los Angeles Pierce College or California Lutheran University keep their classes. Building a life worth staying sober for gets easier when nobody has to give up a paycheck to get a bed.
Calabasas has no acute-care hospital inside its city limits, which is worth knowing before an emergency rather than during one. Families in the city already drive out for hospital care: UCLA West Valley Medical Center at 7300 Medical Center Drive in West Hills, Kaiser Permanente Woodland Hills Medical Center at 5601 De Soto Avenue, or Los Robles Hospital and Medical Center over in Thousand Oaks. From Donna Avenue, Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center is the closest of the options.
Sunshine is a residence, not a medical provider, and it is careful about that line. Residents keep their own doctors, psychiatrists and therapists. Admissions can arrange referrals to licensed California facilities and Joint Commission-accredited facilities for detox, residential rehabilitation or an intensive outpatient program when a higher level of care is what someone actually needs.
Wendy Goldberg, Founder and Director of Admissions, takes the first call, and it stays confidential. She will ask what has happened so far, what level of care is already in place, and what the person is willing to do next week. Insurance can be checked through the site’s verification page, and the intake form covers the practical rest. The house is family-owned, rated 4.7 out of 5 by local reviewers, and has served the recovery community since 2019.
SAMHSA names four dimensions of recovery: health, home, purpose and community. Home sits on that list for a reason, and it is the one a family can act on this week. If the question is which side of the house fits, read about men’s sober living for Calabasas families or the women’s program.
A short map of where the line falls between housing and clinical treatment.
| Area of life | What Sunshine provides | Who handles the clinical side |
|---|---|---|
| Housing | A substance-free home on Donna Avenue, with rules and staff | Not applicable |
| Withdrawal | A referral arranged through admissions before move-in | Licensed detox facilities |
| Therapy | Room in the schedule to attend, and transport planning | Outside therapists and outpatient programs |
| Medical care | A stable address and people who notice symptoms | Hospitals outside Calabasas, since the city has none |
| Daily accountability | Curfew, testing, house meetings, rotating chores | Handled inside the house |
The recovery housing page for the city takes that distinction apart in detail.
From Parkway Calabasas near The Commons, join US-101 east, run past Woodland Hills and exit at Exit 24 (Tampa Avenue), north on Tampa Avenue to Burbank Boulevard, east on Burbank Boulevard, then north on Donna Avenue. Exiting at Reseda Boulevard is an equivalent alternative. That is about 9 miles, roughly 15-22 minutes in normal traffic.
Sunshine Sober LivingThe house is at 5650 Donna Avenue in Tarzana, about nine miles east of Calabasas. The usual run is US-101 east from Parkway Calabasas to Exit 24 at Tampa Avenue, then north to Burbank Boulevard, east a few blocks, and north on Donna Avenue. Expect fifteen to twenty-two minutes in normal traffic.
Yes, and most people should. Residents are expected to work, study or attend outpatient treatment, and plenty commute back west each day. The Agoura Road corridor, The Commons at Calabasas and the Warner Center offices are all within reach, and Metro Line 161 links the city to Warner Center where the G Line begins.
Sunshine Sober Living is home to men and women aged 21 and older, including people with co-occurring mental health conditions, in a substance-free and structured setting. Admissions talks through fit before anyone moves in, including whether a different level of care should come first.
No. Rehab is licensed clinical treatment, with assessment, therapy and medical oversight. Structured sober living is housing with accountability: a curfew, testing, house meetings and a daily schedule. Admissions can arrange referrals for detox, residential rehabilitation or intensive outpatient care when that is what a person needs.
There is no G Line station in Calabasas, so the usual chain is Metro Line 161 to Warner Center and then the G Line east across the Valley. Residents share rides to meetings and appointments, and the house itself sits two blocks from the Tarzana Recreation Center.
This is a recovery residence, not a treatment facility. Detox, residential rehabilitation and intensive outpatient care are delivered by licensed providers, and Sunshine can make the introduction where a higher level of care is the right call. No program can promise a particular result, and we will not suggest otherwise. If you or someone you love needs immediate help, the SAMHSA National Helpline is free and confidential on 1-800-662-4357, 24 hours a day.
If someone you love in Calabasas is finishing treatment and the next address is the open question, call 866-216-9789 and ask for a confidential assessment. Wendy or Elliot will tell you plainly whether this house fits or whether something else should come first. You can also read how the transitional living bridge works before you pick up the phone.