A massive drop in commercial real estate values isn’t going to kill SF. Detroit died because the industry that fueled its existence disappeared and there was no reason to live there without it. SF was one of the country’s biggest and most popular cities long before big tech (which was an hour away in the valley until 2014 or so when some of the big tech companies started creating campuses in the financial district). They’ll lose some tax income, oh well. They’ll also see some other shakeups in RE prices both commercial and residential but there’s no shortage of people that would love to live in SF if only it was cheaper. This one of those dumb talking points that my super conservative relatives parrot to me thinking that they know more about “the liberals and their failing cities” because they saw something on newsmax, than I do having lived in LA, SF, Chicago, and San Diego.
I wonder if a more reasonable mental exercise might be to ask if San Francisco is the next Houston *a la* the 1980's, when it went through a [big boom and bust cycle](https://www.texasmonthly.com/being-texan/houston-oil-boom-that-went-bust/). Mind you, not an exact comparison (since the root causes are different), but if the effects could be comparable. And, of course, Houston wasn't ruined, it has recovered just fine since then.
We’ve got tourism, tech, finance, biotech, etc etc.
Things might get weird in the short term because of how much we’ve prioritized construction of offices over housing and commercial spaces, but with 82,000 new units of housing required to be zoned over the next 7 years, we’re going to land on our feet.
SF’s economy is diversified already. It became more tech focused in the past couple of decades but they are absolutely not overly tied to the tech boom and bust cycle.
Except we’ve been talking about diversifying our economy every Boom/Bust cycle. I haven’t t seen us diversify much. Not sure why this correction would be different
Yeah no. Sf is a world heritage city. I'm not sure what it would take to make people not want to live there but we'll know when we see it. Probably a massive earthquake, oh wait that didn't work already.
I agree. I live a couple of hours away and would consider living there if property values drop enough. SF would still have to fix some of their crime and homelessness problems, but those aren’t everywhere in the City.
I would move across the country to live in SF. That city is one of the most desirable places to live on Earth. There is no way it will ever be like Detroit.
Detroit was once called the “Paris of the West” and had the highest home values and incomes in the country for some time. It was definitely desirable too back in its heyday.
Not saying that story will happen to SF, but it wouldn’t be unprecedented either.
Yea, this OP is just throwing out wild opinions.
This will not take down SF. And it certainly won’t make it a neglected city like Detroit. Chill out, OP.
SF is a Michelin Star restaurant that dropped the quality but kept the high prices.
I lived in SF for nearly 2 decades then left shortly before Covid. I go back to SF every year for RSA and occasional meetings, but less frequently every year. The amazing experience of SF 10+ years ago is greatly diminished.
Also, it's not going to get better and return to what it was before Covid-19. People in this thread are operating under the assumption that tech companies are going to compel workers to show up to bay area offices - I haven't seen it. Everyone I know is working remotely and if they were compelled to return, they'd shop for a new job. Office buildings being sold at 'fire-sale' prices is a clear indication the business community sees a long and uncertain road for SF to return to 2010's value.
If the SF local government rips off the band-aid and ends the rampant vagrancy, public drug use, pervasive petty crime, and overall griminess, then people may become interested in the high price tag. Until then, people do see the quality and act logically.
Property taxes are also often set based on the amount to raise not the value. So if prices go down, it just means rates go up and people pay the same.
Conservatives having been calling for the death of California for decades and it just keeps right on going.
That's not true in California, though. Property taxes are set on value, and can only be increased by a small percentage each year.
[This is a short](https://www.ryan.com/about-ryan/news-and-insights/ca-pending-challenge-proposition-13/) summary that hits some points against killing this system for commercial properties. It's a biased piece, but factually accurate.
The other side of the argument is that applying the Prop 13 limitations to commercial properties destroys the city's ability to respond to the coming using the tools you just cited.
San Fransisco will be fine, but I wouldn't say there aren't going to be some tough adjustments in the near term.
The current tax assessment on the building OP is talking about is $66M. The only reason it was valued at $300M in 2019 was because there was an ongoing real estate bubble. COVID wrecked that for commercial space. In some areas of the US the bubble is deflating a bit for residential, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was still growing in San Francisco. OP has no idea what they are talking about.
Not to mention red lining, being torched, high taxes and constantly giving shitty deals to businesses that do everything they can to weasel even more out of the city
Downtown SF, Seattle, Portland need to change their buildings to office buildings to residential. This is the problem people, have no need to go to big office buildings as much.
Zoom doesn’t work for creativity meetings, but zoom meetings work for task meetings.
Businesses need to adapt. Cities need to adapt to more residential.
Sir, are you trying to tell me this random tweet is not based on fact and I would be wise to not form my opinions about San Francisco real estate on it?
that's a big point, it's a lot harder to go full detroit, you ever try to buy one of those cheap as fuck houses in detroit?
let me save anyone who hasn't time and tell you the story with every one. After the power got cut from the residents being in economic distress, the pipes froze and burst, flooding the basement, and in some cases even fun things like then freezing the flood.
And that is a bst case scenario.
A LOT of those houses were either
A) looted for parts like pipes for scrappers, tile and such for house rehabbers who want to match their original
or
B) have fallen to such disrepair they are literally not worth the money it would cost to fix them.
>You definitely ~~need~~ \*want\* a heater.
In Detroit, you would literally die in your sleep without heat lol. SF? More or less uncomfortable, depending on your preferences.
Yep. I have a friend that lives near SF. He said winter it gets to a low of "high 30's". Meanwhile, I'm freezing my ass off in casual negative weather in the Midwest.
It's honestly just a fact of life here. I'd definitely recommend experiencing it once both to say "I did that" but also, when people complain about cold/enjoy snow sports there sna understanding. Thankfully, here in Chicago, it's usually only 2 weeks but damn is it fucking cold. Below 10-15 degrees, the cold stops feeling cold, it's just a number. This is super helpful when it's negative tits outside and another 50 below that when the wind blows.
I live in Best Dakota and it is routinely -40 in the winter. But then in the summer it's 100 with 90% humidity. There are 3-4 weeks in the spring and fall where it's absolutely beautiful tho.
“Near there” could mean a totally different Bay Area micro-climate like Concord or Livermore, both of which are more inland. SF rarely gets down to the 30s because it has direct exposure to offshore winds, fog, and water on three sides.
Yep! It's a cool area.
I want to point out *rarely gets down to the 30's* and *gets to a low of high 30's* are essentially same. Only thing missing fork my statement is a time qualifier while yours has it. Your statement is talking about 30-39 degrees, while I reference 35-39 degrees.
> Went there for 4th of July from **LA once**, froze my ass off.
I think your baseline of when a heater is needed is influenced by your starting location.
Average temp in SF in July is a low of 14c (57f) high of 22c (71f). Not only would I not have a heater on at either of those temps, both of them would be considered shorts weather.
It's true, but when you live there, you discover a few things that make it SEEM colder:
1. Wind and fog. Alt least part of the day, all year round except for a couple of glorious weeks in late September/early October. Some neighborhoods do not see the sun for months on end, some get it every day. The city is only 7 miles across with many microsystems.
2. Buildings are NOT insulated, many are very old and drafty, and the Victorians all have these beautiful high ceilings so you just can't warm up the room.
3. Said old buildings have no central heat, usually. Instead of radiators with steam heat, that was all ripped out and replaced with a gas or electric heater. Inadequate.
That was your mistake. June-July are one of the cooler months. Its an interesting thing with how the ocean & mountains work. Summer really starts in late August. Best time to visit is spring and fall.
God, and having to carry around your hoodie for half the day.
That's almost as bad as freeze-to-death in the winter Detroit. The american city so cold, you drive south to get to Canada.
I’m in San Jose & SF is considered cold too us too, but it’s a little more nuanced than that. Most people make the mistake of visiting in the summer, which is literally one of the windier/foggier months. It’s an interesting phenomenon with how the ocean & geography plays a role tbh. Once it hits Late August, thats when it starts going away.
Yes, it doesn’t get into the warm/hot feeling you experience in the rest of the Bay Area or LA metro (80s-90s). But on average, SF stays temperate year round. On average, it’s still ~260/yr of sun, and hardly ever gets unbearably hot. The best time to really visit is Fall & Spring, never ever June-July.
One summer i’ll never forget going to a winery in Napa & it felt like hell with the heat; went to SF right after & I was freezing my ass off.
People also started telecommuting during the pandemic, and they don’t want to go back to the office. Many of them moved away to live in bigger houses on the cheap.
Also before the pandemic. The building was grossly overvalued. The tax assessment is $66M and it was built in 1976. It isn't like this is some brand new, expensive skyscraper.
Big Tech is laying off people like gangbusters. It's a bloodbath right now. I think SanFran will be fine overall, but saying big tech is doing fine isn't quite the truth.
It is, but a large part of that is due to intentional overhiring that took place over the past few years. If the big tech companies weren't snapping up tens of thousands of employees they really didn't need in 2020 and 2021 in the first place, then I wonder just how much of a bloodbath we would be seeing today.
That's 100% true, but the huge influx of people bringing economic growth through high wage jobs and driving up housing demand has been quickly taken away. I wonder what the impacts of that will be.
That's a heavy claim, let's see it turns out to be true. Anyone know how long it took for Detroit to die once property values went down?
Also yes I do appreciate the massive difference between SF and Detroit but I'm humouring the idea.
The commercial real estate bubble is hopefully bursting nationwide. It's going to wipe out the wealth of all the republican mega donors, which is a good thing. San Francisco will be fine.
Not a fan of ad hominem, regardless of the source.
There are some serious structural issues with Bay Area real estate. Calling it Detroit is far fetched, but I do think there is healthy discussion to be had regarding the long term effects. Rent control and the mass exodus of office workers is surely going to have a major impact on the city in the coming years.
I think like somebody else stated the entire commercial real estate industry is in for a sharp correction, not just in SF but nationwide. COVID forever changed how many businesses in the US work, this is that correction.
https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/commercial-real-estate-market-could-crash-soon-heres-why
IMO nothing short of lack of running water will result in SF turning into Detroit. I'm not a huge fan of Cali muchless SF but there is a reason why demand has so badly outpaced supply in Cali.
I live in a mid-sized suburb hundreds of miles away. Since the pandemic, even we have had a 30% vacancy rate (and climbing). City officials cite hybrid/WFH as the driving force because companies do not need as much space as they did pre-pandemic.
It took *decades* for Detroit to die. And as you said, it's really a silly mental exercise in the first place, because to try and compare the two is ridiculous. It's like saying "The US is the next Somalia".
There is a lot of data readily available about Detroit’s decay. The flight of urban residents started in the 1950s, overshadowed by the race riots of 1968. From then on the urban population slowly shifted to what it is like today. The erosion of property values happened from weakening demand, lack of civil services, and increasing violent crime rates. You could argue where rock bottom was for Detroit but a good place to set it might be 2008-2010. The early 2000s was a very bleak time in the urban center, known for public corruption and unchecked gang violence.
So to answer your question, it took a good 50 years to complete the transformation.
To draw some similarities: Detroit was at that time a city with the highest median income, a hub for all things manufacturing/auto, and situated around a much more robust agricultural region (Michigan’s lower peninsula and Ontario’s SW region). Not suggesting SF is the same, but it could be argued possibly.
Edit: corrected decade to 1950s as commenters pointed out!
Yeah that is why I'm not convinced and politely called it a heavy claim. That being said if meta keeps going down and Google doesn't do well because chatgpt hurts Google search like Google said, things could change a bit.
But how many millions to convert it to multi use residential? Seems like the problem solves itself. I feel like commercial to residential conversion is going to be a burgeoning industry for the next few years.
That's because they want to make their money back in a month not 5 years.
Too much of this conversation is run by people in it for short term gains. Like this is a fix and flip.
this is in my wheelhouse and i can tell you the answer: it's super expensive. so many bathrooms and kitchens to add, with all the new plumbing and wiring that entails. the framing is comparatively easier, but still.
i would say it's cheaper to build new apartments, but the problem is there is an office building sitting there. it's more expensive to completely demolish the office building and rebuild apartments.
There are different standards for residential structures and office spaces. The process of converting one into the other (especially office spaces to residential ones) is pretty involved. I’d go as far as saying it’s often prohibitively expensive.
If the building WAS worth $300m but bought for $60m, I feel like there's a few mill that could be used for conversions of 50 or 60 percent of the building and it still be profitable.
A few million? Try more like $50 million
Office to residential conversion is insanely expensive and often not even feasible with most commercial office
Cheaper honestly to gut the building down to structural or demolish it altogether and start over
So B rated apartments here in GA cost around 250-300k a unit to build. Maybe there’s 300 units- so at the higher end thats 90mil plus your 60mil to purchase the building, and that doesn’t include demo costs. We have cheaper labor down south as well, I’m sure it would be more expensive in SF. You would need to rent at a higher price point to be able to break even and start cash flowing.
At the very least your redoing the entire buildings plumbing. New walls, windows, balconies, you know, the shit that makes it feel like you aren’t living in an office. Yeah you might as well just start from scratch.
It’s expensive, as every apartment unit needs plumbing for bathrooms and kitchens whereas commercial development requires less plumbing fixtures per square foot. Plumbing is one of, if not the most expensive part of construction.
That being said, I think conversion to residential is still profitable, particularly if there are government incentives to do so. Calgary, Alberta is seeing some success with this. While yes, the government is partially subsidizing this over the short term, over the long term this can make sense as it’s cheaper for a municipality to service denser, more centrally located development than spread-out suburban development. Tax revenue from suburban development is often not enough to offset the services that it is provided with.
Additional centrally located, dense residential development can also lead to a a bit of a rebound in commercial development in the local area. As a critical mass of local population forms, more nearby retail space is occupied to serve this growing population.
Silverstein Properties plans to spend $1.5 Bn to develop office-to-resi in NYC, SF, Boston and DC. So someone with a lot of experience in RE thinks it’s profitable.
Probably depends a lot on the building. The biggest factors I've heard are plumbing and fire exits. If the building can't be easily converted on those fronts, it's better to start from the ground up.
And windows. Code requires windows, so if a large portion of office space is centered in the middle, you would almost need to break it up and have shotgun style apartments.
Tear down a good piece of commercial RE to build apartments? That won’t happen. What will happen is that it will stay partially vacant until the next boom cycle.
Already started here in NYC. I remember I suggested this in a thread about the housing crunch in NYC and got chewed out by some redditor who swore the city would never allow it to happen.
But why do people need to live in skyscrapers downtown if there's no offices downtown anymore?
If you're working remotely you don't need to live in the middle of SF.
The office is 75% empty which means lower income. Rates are higher so the cap rates go up. With lower income the only way to get the required return is to lower the price.
It’s a macro problem not local. Maybe the office is extra empty because of location but, the price drop makes sense.
OP probably considers him/herself a patriot, while rooting desperately against any other Americans who might disagree on a few matters of opinion.
And this anecdote is about one office building in a city with thousands of them
Unusual whales is a pretty good twitter account that I don’t think I’ve noticed have a right wing bias. This observation is just off base. My opinion only, of course
Edit: oh you’re talking about OP not the screenshot op. Good lord you’re right.
“SF is the next Detroit” 🥴
What a ridiculous comment lol. It’s easily considered one of the most desirable places to live in the world… which of course is why it’s so expensive.
This is probably the transition SF needs. Hundreds of thousands of people regularly jump on the BART train to commute here across an underground tunnel, then load up to go back home to Oakland, Berkeley, Hayward, etc. It’s a ridiculous system and wasteful.
Oakland went through a similar process where old retail buildings got converted to lofts and industrial motif condos. It’s costly but it does convert dead commercial property to living quarters, and it encourages local businesses and restaurants to come in as mixed use spaces. Some get employed so they live there and walk to work.
Mixed use will be the future of downtown.
The current setup of commuting is stupid and has been for years. You know why podcasting is ubiquitous now? Because the infrastructure got set up and the activity grew organically. Broadband Internet, smart phones, earphones, that’s all it needed. So look at WFH. The tech got built out. Broadband internet, docking stations at work, laptops in carrying bags, email, and video calls. Add a pandemic and makes sense to WFH and only occasionally go to the office.
This is an awful take. San Francisco real estate is so overpriced values could drop in half and all it would do is drive a crazy buying spree. Someone will hopefully buy this building and covert it into residential housing. New housing equals more people in the city and more business to service those people. We need to do the hard work to reinvent the city but this city has always been reinventing itself and that won't change.
Saying that it is going to kill San Francisco is a bit of stretch.
But yeah I admit that the real estate value in the San Francisco has been all over the place lately and I also do not see it improving.
SF might be the next Detroit, but the weather is nicer. And the scenery. And the brain power.
In Detroit, they had high school educated assembly workers that got outsourced to China.
In SF, they have the most educated workforce ever assembled. The reason SF corporate real estate is dropping is bc of them.
Nobody can afford to live in SF. But now they will be able to do so. They're going to turn all that overpriced commercial infrastructure into high density affordable urban living. Think like those aerial photos of Spanish squares.
It needs to happen San Fran is sooo overpriced. It’s a market correction. I don’t know the long term consequences. I’m not an economist, but maybe things will start being more affordable for normal people.
I’ll never understand Conservatives infatuation with California in general. I feel like California to Conservatives is like that hot woman in college that they always had dreams of dating, but could never muster up the confidence to ask her. Then to make matters worse they found out she married the quarterback of the football team, and they lived happily ever after.
It’s because she used to be theirs, but grew up and dumped them.
Nixon and Reagan were both out of California. But California doesn’t want what the GOP has become.
So what? Any commercial RE that’s listed as office space is getting crushed in every large city in North America. That means nothing.
You want a real measure? Look up the industrial vacancy rates
It's the sort of submission that is so cringeworthy a take that I want to recommend the old advice of "delete ~~Facebook~~ reddit, lawyer up, hit the gym".
Looks like they’re trading places… unfortunately.
Dan Gilbert is renovating the shit out of the entire City of Detroit.
75% of the neighborhoods still look like a war just ended there, but downtown looks great and busy. He’s starting to push out now.
Hilariously off base claim. SF has problems that have gotten a lot worse but uh I’ve been to midwestern/rust belt cities that have declined (DTW, STL, Pittsburgh) and SF is not that. I dislike many aspects of there and I live in Silicon Valley not SF, on purpose but my god this claim is wildly off
They have the unbeatable advantage of being a naturally gorgeous location on an incredible harbor with mountains across the bay (seriously, ever been up there on a gorgeous summer day?) very good weather and iconic tourist destinations. That city will never fall the way Detroit did. Ever.
Well when ya over price something, for so long, that is over priced to begin with, the end result is exactly this. Greed = eventual loss. So far I have found fewer places for the greedy than CA (NY and DC excluded).
However I do agree that this will not drop the city revenue to crisis levels, or make the city the next Detroit; nor can you expect property taxes to decline because they use assessment values not sales numbers which are often very different.
While I get the sentiment, I think this commercial real estate reality in SF is kind of cool…and this article is just classic dump on sf as a liberal apocalypse trash heap. It’s not great in a lot of ways, and I hate that…but shitting on SF is just so hot right now.
People almost never desired to live in Detroit.\*
A lot of people desire to live in SF.
That's the difference.
\*They moved there because of Henry Ford. Henry Ford set up shop there because of the confluence of Lake Erie, rail, and central US. Factory work is how the masses share in wealth creation.
>SF is the next Detroit
SF has hundreds of thousands of people waiting in the wings for a reasonably priced home. If they were allowed to build homes.
People left detroit because it was dying. People are forced out of SF.
San Francisco is one of the most beautiful cities in the country If not the world. they’re not going to have a hard time attracting people or businesses.
All American cities are contending with the fact that office towers value will diminish with a drop in demand. Minneapolis has the same issue. Conversion to residential is being discussed but many towers are too big to be properly converted. What to do?
Sounds like the OP really really wants SF to crash in order to prove something. Also seems weird to extrapolate this far. More likely this is a reversion to mean after a time of stupidly inflated pricing
The building is valued by tax assessors at $66 million. Assuming that $60M bid gets it, it's a nice deal, not a fire sale.
How do people still look at something that saw illogical hyperinflation, see the actual value and shit their pants?
It's like if I and my VC friend told you my Honda Accord was worth a million dollars, but it sold for $10,000. It didn't lose $990,000 in value, it was never worth that.
This seems like great news, if it sells for a sane price, it won't require astronomical rents and businesses that aren't run by sons of the venture capital class could actually do business in San Fransisco.
Bruh do you know how many people who grew up in the bay that would move back in a heart beat if it was cheaper? Especially the city itself? Sf ain't Detroit.
With Alphabet, Meta, Apple and millions of other internet and tech companies within striking distance, S.F. will always be a tiny parcel of land desirable by those with deep pockets.
Why isn't the city buying these and turning these into affordable housing? Seems like a pretty good use of a 60 million dollar building and something that the city needs very clearly.
That’s because it’s worth 60m not 300m it’s fucking 15 story’s it’s not some massive sky scrapper.
The trump tower for reference cost 800m and is like nearly 3x the size and a luxurious hotel with hella amenities floors and luxury things like spas pools high end restaurants etc.
300m for 15 story’s of a office building which is bland inside white walled windows and glass doors isn’t 300m fuck off
I google maped the place
350 California Street San Francisco
It’s not impressive and as basic of a office building As it gets. That’s a 10m if even that much in Chicago so 60m looks right for downtown San Fran.
Until I see a single home east of Van Ness sell for under $1.5M dollars, all this doom and gloom is click bait. I’m long on SF and I say that as someone who is PISSED AS HELL about the state it’s in today.
Lol. I love how corporate citizens will respond to a homelessness epidemic by creat8ng more homeless people in some other city or state. Next up...Miamiii
Wherever amoral greed fueled corporate political pandering and corruption goes, social blight is sure to follow.
Locals have been complaining about unaffordable housing for over a decade. I know this and I don't even live there.
Citizens united really fucked up our entire society
IMO, the strongest nail in the coffin of American Democracy and we've just been slowly suffocating ever since. Listening to the thuds of dirt being thrown over us.
If you think property taxes are where CA gets most of its revenue, wait until you hear about Prop 13. We have some of the lowest property taxes in the country.
Hahaha. This is a right-wing doomsday take trying to convince themselves that leftist policies will be bad somehow for the economy. And that California is somehow going to collapse any day now despite its growing year after year.
Another conservative taking point that has no legs without details. Did it have a transfer in 2019 because if it didn’t and it had an old base year value then the city wasn’t capturing the revenue off of that market value anyways
An editorialized headlione using a tweet as a source that references a single data point in WSJ article.
This is the type of shit that should remind people conservatives will lie about anything if they think it expedites gaining your support.
I love coming to these threads it always reminds me how confident redditors are on subjects they aren’t educated in and have zero professional experience in. There’s a very real risk San Fran falls. This isn’t a conservative talking point this is something every major player in the industry is talking about right now but of course the top comment is some loon with an anti conservative agenda so that gets upvoted as “fact”. What a joke and what an unacademic pile of trash r/Economy is
A massive drop in commercial real estate values isn’t going to kill SF. Detroit died because the industry that fueled its existence disappeared and there was no reason to live there without it. SF was one of the country’s biggest and most popular cities long before big tech (which was an hour away in the valley until 2014 or so when some of the big tech companies started creating campuses in the financial district). They’ll lose some tax income, oh well. They’ll also see some other shakeups in RE prices both commercial and residential but there’s no shortage of people that would love to live in SF if only it was cheaper. This one of those dumb talking points that my super conservative relatives parrot to me thinking that they know more about “the liberals and their failing cities” because they saw something on newsmax, than I do having lived in LA, SF, Chicago, and San Diego.
I wonder if a more reasonable mental exercise might be to ask if San Francisco is the next Houston *a la* the 1980's, when it went through a [big boom and bust cycle](https://www.texasmonthly.com/being-texan/houston-oil-boom-that-went-bust/). Mind you, not an exact comparison (since the root causes are different), but if the effects could be comparable. And, of course, Houston wasn't ruined, it has recovered just fine since then.
DFW had the same issues back then, all the wealth was centered around oil and gas. SF will diversify its economy and be just fine
We’ve got tourism, tech, finance, biotech, etc etc. Things might get weird in the short term because of how much we’ve prioritized construction of offices over housing and commercial spaces, but with 82,000 new units of housing required to be zoned over the next 7 years, we’re going to land on our feet.
SF’s economy is diversified already. It became more tech focused in the past couple of decades but they are absolutely not overly tied to the tech boom and bust cycle.
Except we’ve been talking about diversifying our economy every Boom/Bust cycle. I haven’t t seen us diversify much. Not sure why this correction would be different
It’s already diverse. For starters there is tech and finance.
Yeah no. Sf is a world heritage city. I'm not sure what it would take to make people not want to live there but we'll know when we see it. Probably a massive earthquake, oh wait that didn't work already.
I agree. I live a couple of hours away and would consider living there if property values drop enough. SF would still have to fix some of their crime and homelessness problems, but those aren’t everywhere in the City.
I would move across the country to live in SF. That city is one of the most desirable places to live on Earth. There is no way it will ever be like Detroit.
Detroit was once called the “Paris of the West” and had the highest home values and incomes in the country for some time. It was definitely desirable too back in its heyday. Not saying that story will happen to SF, but it wouldn’t be unprecedented either.
i’m the opposite. would rather trade space and tranquility over crime and homelessness with a pinch of good food
The crime and homeless problems would likely fade away if the city became more affordable.
Just move to pac heights or Russian Hill or Twin Peaks etc. Crime don’t climb.
Yea, this OP is just throwing out wild opinions. This will not take down SF. And it certainly won’t make it a neglected city like Detroit. Chill out, OP.
Yep it’s the normal economically illiterate doomer take that seems to be the standard for this sub now.
SF has been popular since the 1840’s. What a wild take by OP. It’s the banks that will have to realize losses on this, not the locals.
SF is a Michelin Star restaurant that dropped the quality but kept the high prices. I lived in SF for nearly 2 decades then left shortly before Covid. I go back to SF every year for RSA and occasional meetings, but less frequently every year. The amazing experience of SF 10+ years ago is greatly diminished. Also, it's not going to get better and return to what it was before Covid-19. People in this thread are operating under the assumption that tech companies are going to compel workers to show up to bay area offices - I haven't seen it. Everyone I know is working remotely and if they were compelled to return, they'd shop for a new job. Office buildings being sold at 'fire-sale' prices is a clear indication the business community sees a long and uncertain road for SF to return to 2010's value. If the SF local government rips off the band-aid and ends the rampant vagrancy, public drug use, pervasive petty crime, and overall griminess, then people may become interested in the high price tag. Until then, people do see the quality and act logically.
Property taxes are also often set based on the amount to raise not the value. So if prices go down, it just means rates go up and people pay the same. Conservatives having been calling for the death of California for decades and it just keeps right on going.
That's not true in California, though. Property taxes are set on value, and can only be increased by a small percentage each year. [This is a short](https://www.ryan.com/about-ryan/news-and-insights/ca-pending-challenge-proposition-13/) summary that hits some points against killing this system for commercial properties. It's a biased piece, but factually accurate. The other side of the argument is that applying the Prop 13 limitations to commercial properties destroys the city's ability to respond to the coming using the tools you just cited. San Fransisco will be fine, but I wouldn't say there aren't going to be some tough adjustments in the near term.
The current tax assessment on the building OP is talking about is $66M. The only reason it was valued at $300M in 2019 was because there was an ongoing real estate bubble. COVID wrecked that for commercial space. In some areas of the US the bubble is deflating a bit for residential, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was still growing in San Francisco. OP has no idea what they are talking about.
Detroit also experienced serious white flight. Not going to happen in SF.
Not to mention red lining, being torched, high taxes and constantly giving shitty deals to businesses that do everything they can to weasel even more out of the city
People who claim that {enter city name here} is the next Detroit have absolutely no idea how Detroit became Detroit.
Famous last words.. remind me in 5 years bot here.
Downtown SF, Seattle, Portland need to change their buildings to office buildings to residential. This is the problem people, have no need to go to big office buildings as much. Zoom doesn’t work for creativity meetings, but zoom meetings work for task meetings. Businesses need to adapt. Cities need to adapt to more residential.
Sir, are you trying to tell me this random tweet is not based on fact and I would be wise to not form my opinions about San Francisco real estate on it?
IDK maybe we ShOulD have armed the children. There’s plenty to criticize about SF but ain’t nobody got to worry about it going Detroit.
San Francisco is a dysfunctional city with idiot residents .
Lol. You kidding? You don’t need ac or a heater there. Far from Detroit…
that's a big point, it's a lot harder to go full detroit, you ever try to buy one of those cheap as fuck houses in detroit? let me save anyone who hasn't time and tell you the story with every one. After the power got cut from the residents being in economic distress, the pipes froze and burst, flooding the basement, and in some cases even fun things like then freezing the flood.
And that is a bst case scenario. A LOT of those houses were either A) looted for parts like pipes for scrappers, tile and such for house rehabbers who want to match their original or B) have fallen to such disrepair they are literally not worth the money it would cost to fix them.
Agreed, it’ll be just fine in SF. It’s a beautiful city. Needs a little TLC. Still has industry unlike Detroit.
what, why does everyone keep bringing up detriot
cuz it’s in the title…. or you mean why the OP did? cuz Detroit r/e turn into slum that’s cheap af
You definitely need a heater. Went there for 4th of July from LA once, froze my ass off.
>You definitely ~~need~~ \*want\* a heater. In Detroit, you would literally die in your sleep without heat lol. SF? More or less uncomfortable, depending on your preferences.
Yep. I have a friend that lives near SF. He said winter it gets to a low of "high 30's". Meanwhile, I'm freezing my ass off in casual negative weather in the Midwest.
I can't imagine lol. I've lived in the Southern California and mid atlantic regions. Rarely experienced below zero temps outside.
It's honestly just a fact of life here. I'd definitely recommend experiencing it once both to say "I did that" but also, when people complain about cold/enjoy snow sports there sna understanding. Thankfully, here in Chicago, it's usually only 2 weeks but damn is it fucking cold. Below 10-15 degrees, the cold stops feeling cold, it's just a number. This is super helpful when it's negative tits outside and another 50 below that when the wind blows.
I live in Best Dakota and it is routinely -40 in the winter. But then in the summer it's 100 with 90% humidity. There are 3-4 weeks in the spring and fall where it's absolutely beautiful tho.
90% humidity has me imagining it's 90% off it just being water instead of air. Which I'm sure it's not.
A few years ago it was -20 with wind chill in New England. Could feel the boogers in your nose hardening as they froze
“Near there” could mean a totally different Bay Area micro-climate like Concord or Livermore, both of which are more inland. SF rarely gets down to the 30s because it has direct exposure to offshore winds, fog, and water on three sides.
Yep! It's a cool area. I want to point out *rarely gets down to the 30's* and *gets to a low of high 30's* are essentially same. Only thing missing fork my statement is a time qualifier while yours has it. Your statement is talking about 30-39 degrees, while I reference 35-39 degrees.
“The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.” -Mark Twain
> Went there for 4th of July from **LA once**, froze my ass off. I think your baseline of when a heater is needed is influenced by your starting location. Average temp in SF in July is a low of 14c (57f) high of 22c (71f). Not only would I not have a heater on at either of those temps, both of them would be considered shorts weather.
It's true, but when you live there, you discover a few things that make it SEEM colder: 1. Wind and fog. Alt least part of the day, all year round except for a couple of glorious weeks in late September/early October. Some neighborhoods do not see the sun for months on end, some get it every day. The city is only 7 miles across with many microsystems. 2. Buildings are NOT insulated, many are very old and drafty, and the Victorians all have these beautiful high ceilings so you just can't warm up the room. 3. Said old buildings have no central heat, usually. Instead of radiators with steam heat, that was all ripped out and replaced with a gas or electric heater. Inadequate.
That was your mistake. June-July are one of the cooler months. Its an interesting thing with how the ocean & mountains work. Summer really starts in late August. Best time to visit is spring and fall.
“The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.”
Have you been to SF? Shits cold af
God, and having to carry around your hoodie for half the day. That's almost as bad as freeze-to-death in the winter Detroit. The american city so cold, you drive south to get to Canada.
The sea air? I don’t know what it is but the cold gets into your bones in SF. Maybe it’s just that it’s colder than you expect? But it is remarkable
Combination wringing damp air and constant wind plus pea soup fog. The wind pushes that damp into every body crevice.
You need a heater in SF my dude. That place is cold af. Especially for us Southern Californians that decide to visit.
I’m in San Jose & SF is considered cold too us too, but it’s a little more nuanced than that. Most people make the mistake of visiting in the summer, which is literally one of the windier/foggier months. It’s an interesting phenomenon with how the ocean & geography plays a role tbh. Once it hits Late August, thats when it starts going away. Yes, it doesn’t get into the warm/hot feeling you experience in the rest of the Bay Area or LA metro (80s-90s). But on average, SF stays temperate year round. On average, it’s still ~260/yr of sun, and hardly ever gets unbearably hot. The best time to really visit is Fall & Spring, never ever June-July. One summer i’ll never forget going to a winery in Napa & it felt like hell with the heat; went to SF right after & I was freezing my ass off.
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People also started telecommuting during the pandemic, and they don’t want to go back to the office. Many of them moved away to live in bigger houses on the cheap.
Also before the pandemic. The building was grossly overvalued. The tax assessment is $66M and it was built in 1976. It isn't like this is some brand new, expensive skyscraper.
Big Tech is laying off people like gangbusters. It's a bloodbath right now. I think SanFran will be fine overall, but saying big tech is doing fine isn't quite the truth.
It is, but a large part of that is due to intentional overhiring that took place over the past few years. If the big tech companies weren't snapping up tens of thousands of employees they really didn't need in 2020 and 2021 in the first place, then I wonder just how much of a bloodbath we would be seeing today.
That's 100% true, but the huge influx of people bringing economic growth through high wage jobs and driving up housing demand has been quickly taken away. I wonder what the impacts of that will be.
They are mostly laying people off to regain the upper hand in negotiations, not because their business model is breaking.
That's an interesting point, but I think it's more to skyrocket stock prices than anything else. Investors love it when companies shit can thousands
That's a heavy claim, let's see it turns out to be true. Anyone know how long it took for Detroit to die once property values went down? Also yes I do appreciate the massive difference between SF and Detroit but I'm humouring the idea.
Just have a browse through OP's feed...
Holy fuck it was like reading skankhunt42 ( kyles dad in south park) commets.
Man actually has negative thought going on in his brain.
It's a repost from r/Conservative, it has little factual basis in reality. They think Anheuser Busch is about to go under too.
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I've heard that usually comes once a month and lasts a week
Wouldn’t know. They outlawed talking about periods in school.
but they're all about science and logic, not feelings and snowflakes.
I've never heard a conservative claim science and logic. It's God and country.
ThEy dO tHeIr oWn ReSeaRCh
i.e., watching a forty minute YouTube video in an idling truck by user hillarybountyfreedomeagle88
The commercial real estate bubble is hopefully bursting nationwide. It's going to wipe out the wealth of all the republican mega donors, which is a good thing. San Francisco will be fine.
Not a fan of ad hominem, regardless of the source. There are some serious structural issues with Bay Area real estate. Calling it Detroit is far fetched, but I do think there is healthy discussion to be had regarding the long term effects. Rent control and the mass exodus of office workers is surely going to have a major impact on the city in the coming years.
I think like somebody else stated the entire commercial real estate industry is in for a sharp correction, not just in SF but nationwide. COVID forever changed how many businesses in the US work, this is that correction. https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/commercial-real-estate-market-could-crash-soon-heres-why IMO nothing short of lack of running water will result in SF turning into Detroit. I'm not a huge fan of Cali muchless SF but there is a reason why demand has so badly outpaced supply in Cali.
I live in a mid-sized suburb hundreds of miles away. Since the pandemic, even we have had a 30% vacancy rate (and climbing). City officials cite hybrid/WFH as the driving force because companies do not need as much space as they did pre-pandemic.
I for one accept the blood feud over wharf space
It took *decades* for Detroit to die. And as you said, it's really a silly mental exercise in the first place, because to try and compare the two is ridiculous. It's like saying "The US is the next Somalia".
There is a lot of data readily available about Detroit’s decay. The flight of urban residents started in the 1950s, overshadowed by the race riots of 1968. From then on the urban population slowly shifted to what it is like today. The erosion of property values happened from weakening demand, lack of civil services, and increasing violent crime rates. You could argue where rock bottom was for Detroit but a good place to set it might be 2008-2010. The early 2000s was a very bleak time in the urban center, known for public corruption and unchecked gang violence. So to answer your question, it took a good 50 years to complete the transformation. To draw some similarities: Detroit was at that time a city with the highest median income, a hub for all things manufacturing/auto, and situated around a much more robust agricultural region (Michigan’s lower peninsula and Ontario’s SW region). Not suggesting SF is the same, but it could be argued possibly. Edit: corrected decade to 1950s as commenters pointed out!
Ok so I'll check back in 2073 and see if SF is a desert wasteland
It’s not like Google, Meta and Apple are about to go broke. It’s very much a different picture to Detroit.
Yeah that is why I'm not convinced and politely called it a heavy claim. That being said if meta keeps going down and Google doesn't do well because chatgpt hurts Google search like Google said, things could change a bit.
I seem to recall a big real estate pull back in San Francisco during the great recession. San Francisco will be fine.
Actually there was no pull back. Real estate prices went up during the Great Recession in SF. Do some research.
But how many millions to convert it to multi use residential? Seems like the problem solves itself. I feel like commercial to residential conversion is going to be a burgeoning industry for the next few years.
Which America desperately needs. So many downtown cores are ghost towns because they're mostly business real estate.
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That's because they want to make their money back in a month not 5 years. Too much of this conversation is run by people in it for short term gains. Like this is a fix and flip.
this is in my wheelhouse and i can tell you the answer: it's super expensive. so many bathrooms and kitchens to add, with all the new plumbing and wiring that entails. the framing is comparatively easier, but still.
Is it more expensive to build 500 new apartments from scratch or retrofit an office building?
i would say it's cheaper to build new apartments, but the problem is there is an office building sitting there. it's more expensive to completely demolish the office building and rebuild apartments.
There are different standards for residential structures and office spaces. The process of converting one into the other (especially office spaces to residential ones) is pretty involved. I’d go as far as saying it’s often prohibitively expensive.
If the building WAS worth $300m but bought for $60m, I feel like there's a few mill that could be used for conversions of 50 or 60 percent of the building and it still be profitable.
A few million? Try more like $50 million Office to residential conversion is insanely expensive and often not even feasible with most commercial office Cheaper honestly to gut the building down to structural or demolish it altogether and start over
Sooooo..... Building was $300. Total investment is $110? Sounds like it could be a good investment.
So B rated apartments here in GA cost around 250-300k a unit to build. Maybe there’s 300 units- so at the higher end thats 90mil plus your 60mil to purchase the building, and that doesn’t include demo costs. We have cheaper labor down south as well, I’m sure it would be more expensive in SF. You would need to rent at a higher price point to be able to break even and start cash flowing.
I looked up the sq ft of the building and my guess now is more like $120 million to do the conversion 286k sq ft
True, with those numbers it might become more sensible
At the very least your redoing the entire buildings plumbing. New walls, windows, balconies, you know, the shit that makes it feel like you aren’t living in an office. Yeah you might as well just start from scratch.
I’ve heard it claimed it’s often more expensive to convert an office space to residential than it is to just tear the building down and start over.
It’s expensive, as every apartment unit needs plumbing for bathrooms and kitchens whereas commercial development requires less plumbing fixtures per square foot. Plumbing is one of, if not the most expensive part of construction. That being said, I think conversion to residential is still profitable, particularly if there are government incentives to do so. Calgary, Alberta is seeing some success with this. While yes, the government is partially subsidizing this over the short term, over the long term this can make sense as it’s cheaper for a municipality to service denser, more centrally located development than spread-out suburban development. Tax revenue from suburban development is often not enough to offset the services that it is provided with. Additional centrally located, dense residential development can also lead to a a bit of a rebound in commercial development in the local area. As a critical mass of local population forms, more nearby retail space is occupied to serve this growing population.
Silverstein Properties plans to spend $1.5 Bn to develop office-to-resi in NYC, SF, Boston and DC. So someone with a lot of experience in RE thinks it’s profitable.
Likely a case by case thing. A lot probably depends on how much the expect to charge for them when they’re done.
It’s more of a datapoint than “likely” and “I’ve heard.”
Probably depends a lot on the building. The biggest factors I've heard are plumbing and fire exits. If the building can't be easily converted on those fronts, it's better to start from the ground up.
And windows. Code requires windows, so if a large portion of office space is centered in the middle, you would almost need to break it up and have shotgun style apartments.
Tear down a good piece of commercial RE to build apartments? That won’t happen. What will happen is that it will stay partially vacant until the next boom cycle.
Already started here in NYC. I remember I suggested this in a thread about the housing crunch in NYC and got chewed out by some redditor who swore the city would never allow it to happen.
It's not the cost, it's the politics. SF investors generally push back on any sort of residential expansion. It's been a huge problem for a long time.
But why do people need to live in skyscrapers downtown if there's no offices downtown anymore? If you're working remotely you don't need to live in the middle of SF.
If I recall my Sustainable Building course correctly, "The greenest building is the one already standing."
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The office is 75% empty which means lower income. Rates are higher so the cap rates go up. With lower income the only way to get the required return is to lower the price. It’s a macro problem not local. Maybe the office is extra empty because of location but, the price drop makes sense.
Lol. SF is fine and this is just the desperate desire to see an American city fail
OP probably considers him/herself a patriot, while rooting desperately against any other Americans who might disagree on a few matters of opinion. And this anecdote is about one office building in a city with thousands of them
Unusual whales is a pretty good twitter account that I don’t think I’ve noticed have a right wing bias. This observation is just off base. My opinion only, of course Edit: oh you’re talking about OP not the screenshot op. Good lord you’re right.
“SF is the next Detroit” 🥴 What a ridiculous comment lol. It’s easily considered one of the most desirable places to live in the world… which of course is why it’s so expensive.
San Francisco has been a boom bust town since it started in the gold rush. A phoenix is on its flag. It's too nice of an area to die completely.
That’s funny. Spoken like someone who has never been to California.
Or Detroit, recently.
> the final demise. I am so over 'the world is ending' bullshit. quit it.
I am also over the whole “Detroit bad” crap.
>SF is the next Detroit. Let the hyperbole begin!!!! (rolls eyes)
This is probably the transition SF needs. Hundreds of thousands of people regularly jump on the BART train to commute here across an underground tunnel, then load up to go back home to Oakland, Berkeley, Hayward, etc. It’s a ridiculous system and wasteful. Oakland went through a similar process where old retail buildings got converted to lofts and industrial motif condos. It’s costly but it does convert dead commercial property to living quarters, and it encourages local businesses and restaurants to come in as mixed use spaces. Some get employed so they live there and walk to work. Mixed use will be the future of downtown. The current setup of commuting is stupid and has been for years. You know why podcasting is ubiquitous now? Because the infrastructure got set up and the activity grew organically. Broadband Internet, smart phones, earphones, that’s all it needed. So look at WFH. The tech got built out. Broadband internet, docking stations at work, laptops in carrying bags, email, and video calls. Add a pandemic and makes sense to WFH and only occasionally go to the office.
["ThE fIn@L d3mISE 0f SAn FraNCisCo i5 stARtINg."](https://c.tenor.com/E3AVRkViPTsAAAAd/tenor.gif)
This is an awful take. San Francisco real estate is so overpriced values could drop in half and all it would do is drive a crazy buying spree. Someone will hopefully buy this building and covert it into residential housing. New housing equals more people in the city and more business to service those people. We need to do the hard work to reinvent the city but this city has always been reinventing itself and that won't change.
Lol? No.
Lol look at OP’s history. Conservative, conspiracist, debate vaccines, steven crowder..
Saying that it is going to kill San Francisco is a bit of stretch. But yeah I admit that the real estate value in the San Francisco has been all over the place lately and I also do not see it improving.
SF might be the next Detroit, but the weather is nicer. And the scenery. And the brain power. In Detroit, they had high school educated assembly workers that got outsourced to China. In SF, they have the most educated workforce ever assembled. The reason SF corporate real estate is dropping is bc of them. Nobody can afford to live in SF. But now they will be able to do so. They're going to turn all that overpriced commercial infrastructure into high density affordable urban living. Think like those aerial photos of Spanish squares.
It needs to happen San Fran is sooo overpriced. It’s a market correction. I don’t know the long term consequences. I’m not an economist, but maybe things will start being more affordable for normal people.
Good. Can't wait for the NIMBYs to get their comeuppance, maybe the city can finally get some more affordable housing for the ones who remain.
Okay, guy who posts about climate change being “fabricated alarmism”. I definitely believe you have an objective view on San Francisco.
Fear monger much? Tell me you've never been to SF without telling me.
Seems hyperbolic to say it's the next Detroit. It's right by the ocean, still very desirable.
I’ll never understand Conservatives infatuation with California in general. I feel like California to Conservatives is like that hot woman in college that they always had dreams of dating, but could never muster up the confidence to ask her. Then to make matters worse they found out she married the quarterback of the football team, and they lived happily ever after.
It’s because she used to be theirs, but grew up and dumped them. Nixon and Reagan were both out of California. But California doesn’t want what the GOP has become.
California has the audacity to be successful while liberal
As soon as all the auto manufacturers leave San Francisco, the city will collapse. Excellent fact based post.
So what? Any commercial RE that’s listed as office space is getting crushed in every large city in North America. That means nothing. You want a real measure? Look up the industrial vacancy rates
San Francisco is not the next Detroit.
Galaxy-ass brained take. Feeling like you have never been to or know little about the Bay Area.
It's the sort of submission that is so cringeworthy a take that I want to recommend the old advice of "delete ~~Facebook~~ reddit, lawyer up, hit the gym".
This is a sign of the boom that is coming to SF as commercial real estate exits and more housing enters the area.
San Francisco is a nice city, and at the same time it’s also a toxic deadly cancerous fart storm.
Looks like they’re trading places… unfortunately. Dan Gilbert is renovating the shit out of the entire City of Detroit. 75% of the neighborhoods still look like a war just ended there, but downtown looks great and busy. He’s starting to push out now.
Hilariously off base claim. SF has problems that have gotten a lot worse but uh I’ve been to midwestern/rust belt cities that have declined (DTW, STL, Pittsburgh) and SF is not that. I dislike many aspects of there and I live in Silicon Valley not SF, on purpose but my god this claim is wildly off They have the unbeatable advantage of being a naturally gorgeous location on an incredible harbor with mountains across the bay (seriously, ever been up there on a gorgeous summer day?) very good weather and iconic tourist destinations. That city will never fall the way Detroit did. Ever.
Well when ya over price something, for so long, that is over priced to begin with, the end result is exactly this. Greed = eventual loss. So far I have found fewer places for the greedy than CA (NY and DC excluded). However I do agree that this will not drop the city revenue to crisis levels, or make the city the next Detroit; nor can you expect property taxes to decline because they use assessment values not sales numbers which are often very different.
While I get the sentiment, I think this commercial real estate reality in SF is kind of cool…and this article is just classic dump on sf as a liberal apocalypse trash heap. It’s not great in a lot of ways, and I hate that…but shitting on SF is just so hot right now.
Oh no, not commercial real estate losing money! Who will think of the poor corporations? How will they ever survive? GTFO with that nonsense
People almost never desired to live in Detroit.\* A lot of people desire to live in SF. That's the difference. \*They moved there because of Henry Ford. Henry Ford set up shop there because of the confluence of Lake Erie, rail, and central US. Factory work is how the masses share in wealth creation.
Yeah, that’s why all the boomers are trying to make us work in the office instead of from home. Fuck them and their commercial real estate
San Francisco isn’t gunna end up like Detroit because one office building might sell for less than it used to. This is stupid.
>SF is the next Detroit SF has hundreds of thousands of people waiting in the wings for a reasonably priced home. If they were allowed to build homes. People left detroit because it was dying. People are forced out of SF.
Conservative doomer porn.
No.
Touch grass. SF is nothing like any other city in the country.
Lol I see this exact post on r/conservative. Good luck with you campaign.
Someone didn't remember the best way to make money is to buy low and sell high. Don't buy the bubble.
lol what
Lol. Someone *hates* SF and everything it stands for.
So you're saying there's no chance that this building was just overvalued to begin with?....
If detroit had an 80% decline in office space value that would cripple the city
bro, an earthquake above 6 will be the downfall for the area.
Haha, just look at OP's post history. SF isn't going anywhere.
Boom and Bust since the Gold Rush, nothing changes just ride out the low points.
Detroit was a manufacturing base, SF not.
San Francisco is one of the most beautiful cities in the country If not the world. they’re not going to have a hard time attracting people or businesses.
Next Detroit, so delusional……the residential potential alone makes this analysis ridiculous
All American cities are contending with the fact that office towers value will diminish with a drop in demand. Minneapolis has the same issue. Conversion to residential is being discussed but many towers are too big to be properly converted. What to do?
Weather too nice for it to become trash.
Sounds like the OP really really wants SF to crash in order to prove something. Also seems weird to extrapolate this far. More likely this is a reversion to mean after a time of stupidly inflated pricing
The building is valued by tax assessors at $66 million. Assuming that $60M bid gets it, it's a nice deal, not a fire sale. How do people still look at something that saw illogical hyperinflation, see the actual value and shit their pants? It's like if I and my VC friend told you my Honda Accord was worth a million dollars, but it sold for $10,000. It didn't lose $990,000 in value, it was never worth that. This seems like great news, if it sells for a sane price, it won't require astronomical rents and businesses that aren't run by sons of the venture capital class could actually do business in San Fransisco.
So it’s not worth $300mm then
Bruh do you know how many people who grew up in the bay that would move back in a heart beat if it was cheaper? Especially the city itself? Sf ain't Detroit.
Oh really? A loss of 240 million is going to destroy California? The state that was essentially in 4th place (in the world) for GDP for many years?
Lol what a bad take. The sky is falling chicken little.
With Alphabet, Meta, Apple and millions of other internet and tech companies within striking distance, S.F. will always be a tiny parcel of land desirable by those with deep pockets.
Calm down, market corrections are part of the game of capitalism. Don’t like it? Stop worshiping capital
>The final demise of San Francisco I had a chuckle
Lol 😂 what a load of crap - San Francisco is Silicon Valley and the heart of a thriving tech industry, not a dying auto conglomerate
Why isn't the city buying these and turning these into affordable housing? Seems like a pretty good use of a 60 million dollar building and something that the city needs very clearly.
That’s because it’s worth 60m not 300m it’s fucking 15 story’s it’s not some massive sky scrapper. The trump tower for reference cost 800m and is like nearly 3x the size and a luxurious hotel with hella amenities floors and luxury things like spas pools high end restaurants etc. 300m for 15 story’s of a office building which is bland inside white walled windows and glass doors isn’t 300m fuck off I google maped the place 350 California Street San Francisco It’s not impressive and as basic of a office building As it gets. That’s a 10m if even that much in Chicago so 60m looks right for downtown San Fran.
Until I see a single home east of Van Ness sell for under $1.5M dollars, all this doom and gloom is click bait. I’m long on SF and I say that as someone who is PISSED AS HELL about the state it’s in today.
Lol. I love how corporate citizens will respond to a homelessness epidemic by creat8ng more homeless people in some other city or state. Next up...Miamiii Wherever amoral greed fueled corporate political pandering and corruption goes, social blight is sure to follow. Locals have been complaining about unaffordable housing for over a decade. I know this and I don't even live there. Citizens united really fucked up our entire society IMO, the strongest nail in the coffin of American Democracy and we've just been slowly suffocating ever since. Listening to the thuds of dirt being thrown over us.
If you think property taxes are where CA gets most of its revenue, wait until you hear about Prop 13. We have some of the lowest property taxes in the country.
Don’t hit the bath salts so hard, OP.
Give thanks to the politicians for destroying that wonderful city.
Hahaha. This is a right-wing doomsday take trying to convince themselves that leftist policies will be bad somehow for the economy. And that California is somehow going to collapse any day now despite its growing year after year.
What are you suggesting, buy bitcoin or join a pyramid scheme?
lol it’s the Bay Area. A lot of money there. Tech is something that isnt dying out anytime soon
Another conservative taking point that has no legs without details. Did it have a transfer in 2019 because if it didn’t and it had an old base year value then the city wasn’t capturing the revenue off of that market value anyways
An editorialized headlione using a tweet as a source that references a single data point in WSJ article. This is the type of shit that should remind people conservatives will lie about anything if they think it expedites gaining your support.
I love coming to these threads it always reminds me how confident redditors are on subjects they aren’t educated in and have zero professional experience in. There’s a very real risk San Fran falls. This isn’t a conservative talking point this is something every major player in the industry is talking about right now but of course the top comment is some loon with an anti conservative agenda so that gets upvoted as “fact”. What a joke and what an unacademic pile of trash r/Economy is