San Francisco Luxury Home Market Logs Key Sales

San Francisco’s rejuvenated spring luxury market was the subject of much focus this week, from the long-awaited sale of the city’s most expensive listing to a quick trade on ESPN analyst and former Warriors GM Bob Myers’ Presidio Heights home.

Myers and wife Kristen bought the 6,300-square-foot six-bedroom, four-bathroom and two half-bath home at 200 Laurel Street in April 2016 for $10.3 million and sold it for $12.6 million, according to property records.

Listing agent Janet Schindler listed the home for $12.9 million on Jan. 22 and it was in contract on Feb. 21, according to Redfin. Schindler declined to comment on the sale, citing a non-disclosure agreement. Mapache Listo LLC, which was represented by Tyler Stewart of Heath Real Estate, was the buyer.

Stewart told The Real Deal her clients already had a home in Presidio Heights and a very narrow area that they were looking at for a larger home amid extremely limited inventory.

“In this specific location, which is essentially a four-block radius, you get maybe one house a year,” she said. “So when those houses come up, it is obviously a very lovely home, but it’s really location driven.”

$1M over asking in Presidio Heights

Location was also key to the sale of a home just around the corner at 3333 Jackson Street, which went more than $1 million over the $6.5 million asking price, despite the fact that it had a “choose your own adventure” level of work to be done, according to Compass agent John Townsend, who represented the buyers. He said that for years having a house in the city that needed “some TLC” was seen as a “tough sell,” but that buyer mindsets seem to be changing this year.

Listing agent Ted Bartlett of Compass said that he and his co-listing agents “carefully priced” 3333 Jackson, which had been in the same family for over four decades.

“We knew potential buyers would be excited about the opportunity and compete for the opportunity to make it their family home,” he said, adding that it went into contract after just eight days on the market.

SF’s most expensive listing sells for $26M

While some high-end northside homes are selling in just days, San Francisco’s most expensive listing finally sold after about 10 months on the market.

Brokers Joe Lucier and Stacey Caen of Sotheby’s International Realty listed the home of the late philanthropists Fritz and Lucy Jewett for $38 million last June, dropped the price to $32 million in October and sold it for $26.5 million on March 25. It was the first time the 10,200-square-foot property at the top of the Lyon Street Steps next to the Presidio has traded hands since it was built in 1987.

Pete Rodway of Compass represented the buyer and couldn’t comment specifically on the sale due to a non-disclosure agreement but said, in general, “We have not seen this level of buyer activity since the fever pitch market of 2022, which continues to be fueled by local buyers in the tech sector and adjacent industries.”

Default imminent for Berkeley’s largest hotel

In addition to the San Francisco residential news, Berkeley’s hospitality industry also hit the headlines when TRD reported that the $48.3 million loan on the city’s largest hotel and biggest waterfront tenant was headed toward default, according to Morningstar. The 378-room DoubleTree Berkeley Marina had a debt service coverage ratio of just .34x last year and has been below issuance since the pandemic, according to Morningstar.

Hong Kong-based Junson Capital, the family office for Chinese billionaire Cai Kui, has owned the waterfront hotel since 2014 through 200 Marina LLC. The loans in question were originated by Wells Fargo and UBS in 2017 and packaged into a commercial mortgage-backed securities offering that year.

Bingdong Zhao, the New York-based head of Junson’s Real Estate Investment Division, is listed as the manager of 200 Marina LLC in city documents. He did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Receiver asks for more time to close Park Hotels debt sale

In further hotel debt news, after TRD reported on March 6 that lenders had found a mystery buyer for Park Hotels’ $725M debt sale, the receiver asked the courts this week for more time to close the deal.

Virginia-based Park Hotels walked away from the 1,921-room Hilton San Francisco Union Square and 1,024-room Parc 55 San Francisco in 2023 and Eastdil began marketing the debt for sale last July.

The deal originally needed to close by March 31 in order to avoid going back to lender JP Morgan Chase for foreclosure. Receiver Michelle Russo of HotelAVE asked a San Francisco court to extend the sale deadline to May 20.

Russo’s sale extension request states, “the Receiver has made substantial progress on a sale of the hotels to a third party… and believes she will be in a position to file a motion to approve the sale imminently.”