Los Angeles ? John and Ruby Haynal could do nothing to stop a wildfire 15 years ago that turned their hillside home high above the freeways and urban clatter into scorched rubble.

This week, the retired couple stood outside the glass-and-stucco house they built on the same spot, staring at a mudslide that ripped open the foundation of a four-story mansion just above them and buried nearby cars and a swimming pool.

As piping hissed within the mansion’s exposed guts and nearby residents evacuated damaged homes with pets and suitcases in tow, the Haynals didn’t flinch.

If they ever leave their beloved hillside outside Los Angeles, it will be for the convenience of a smaller home, not worry about mudslides and wildfires that have left a mark here.

They are among many Californians determined to cling to their slice of hilltop splendor despite the constant threat of natural disasters.

“It’s the natural setting,” John Haynal said, squinting his eyes as he canvassed the chaparral clinging to the hills, framed by the first blue sky California had seen after five days of record rainfall. “It’s because of the property.”

The recent lethal storms in the region saw houses washed away or churned to splinters in mountains of sliding muck. The weather was the latest reminder of the precarious balance of life in the hills.

The most tragic example of the unpredictability of nature came 70 miles northwest of Los Angeles, in the drowsy seaside community of La Conchita. A roiling slough of mud broke away from surrounding cliffs, killing 10 and burying part of the town.

Homeowners who loved the town’s seclusion and off-the-grid atmosphere knew the threat. The town was built on land cleared by the Southern Pacific Railroad after a slide nearly a century ago that killed four people. Just a decade ago, another mudslide destroyed nine homes.

A large mound of earth remains where a large mudslide killed 10 people and damaged more than a dozen homes in the coastal community of La Conchito, Calif. The community suffered a similar mudslide, killing residents and destroying homes, in 1995. Despite the dangers of living in scenic splendor atop hills or on their slopes, many California homeowners are willing to live with the risks from natural disasters.

Ventura County Sheriff Bob Brooks said the area always would be “geologically hazardous” and warned residents against returning to the town because of the danger of another collapse.

“If you want to live in this kind of community, you’re going to have these obstacles,” said La Conchita resident Bob Voigt, 62, whose home was nearly hit by the slide. “I lived in Malibu for 25 years and I had fire on the property seven times.”

“We are not afraid to stay in La Conchita,” added 24-year resident Jack Falk, 48. “We are in a beautiful part of the world and we desire to live nowhere else.”

Numerous lofty or remote addresses that offer serenity, privacy or status are at once embraced and threatened by California’s natural beauty.

“There are a lot of gloriously beautiful spots. But when the weather turns crummy, they can exact a stiff price,” said Jack Kyser, chief economist of the Los Angeles Economic Development Corp. “Common sense says … it’s better to live on flat land, but people make these tradeoffs.”

The lure of Southern California has long been its scenic beauty and climate, even if it can witness nature in extremes.

The state’s topography is younger than the eastern United States, crisscrossed by shifting earthquake faults. That helps explain the frequent instability of its surface, particularly on steep slopes.

“This stuff is not very strong — it’s weak, sedimentary rocks, consolidated mud,” said research geologist Douglas Morton, who analyzes slide risks for the federal government. “You add water and what do you get?”