The fire was reported just before 11 p.m. Monday in the area of Malibu Canyon Road north of Pacific Coast Highway. It started at just about 10 acres but quickly spread through the evening hours and into Tuesday morning.
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Eyewitness News surveyed the Serra Retreat area where at least one home at the corner of Palm Canyon Lane and Cross Creek Road was destroyed. The guesthouse of a separate home was also destroyed.
Flames could be seen burning along Malibu Canyon Road and in eastern Malibu near Carbon Mesa Road.
Residents battle blaze
Rivers Redclay has lived in Malibu her entire life but has only lived in Serra Retreat for about a year. She told ABC7 she got home Monday around 10:30 p.m. - that's when she first started to hear about the fire.
"Everyone on this property, we had a group chat ... we sent a message, we said, 'Don't worry ... we're only in trouble if the fire comes behind us,'" she recalled. "Surely enough, the next message after that was, 'Fire in Malibu Canyon.'"
Redclay immediately started notifying her neighbors.
"I just sprinted down the street and started banging on everybody's door and was like, 'Get up!'" she said.
Redclay stayed at her home all night, fighting through the blaze. She said her dad came down to help her.
"The smoke was so thick you couldn't really see," she said.
During a press conference Tuesday, fire officials said "minimal homes" were destroyed, which came as a relief for Redclay.
"It was crazy. It's insane," she said. "I mean, they had so many fire trucks in here, the people that know this land, they really fought for it."
Alec Gellis, another Serra Retreat resident, said he did everything he could to help.
"We were fighting the fire all night," he said. "We were surrounded by flames. Our house had trees on fire and I got those out."
"I would've loved to help this house," he pointed to the nearby destroyed home. "This is my friend's house and it's really tragic."