Grocery Outlet Heir Sells SF Co-op for 2025 Record $15.5M

A former CEO of Grocery Outlet has sold his full-floor, furnished Pacific Heights co-op for $15.5 million, according to listing agent Joseph Lucier of Sotheby’s International Realty – San Francisco Brokerage — half a million off the lowered asking price from last fall and a new high for co-ops and condos in the city in 2025.

MacGregor Read and his wife Mary first listed Apartment 3 in 2000 Washington for $18 million in September last year, two years after Read retired from the Emeryville-based discount chain his grandfather James Read founded in 1946. He served as the co-CEO between 2006 and 2018, according to a Grocery Outlet announcement from the time, and was the vice chairman of the board when he retired.

After the fall price cut, the 5,000-square-foot three bedroom with three full and two half baths in one of the city’s premier co-op buildings went off the market for the holidays. It relisted in early February at the same price and the Golden Gate Bridge-view home with three-car parking found a buyer about six weeks later. The sale closed on April 11 for $15 million, or about $2,800 per square foot, according to the transfer tax, but Lucier said the price was $15.5 million, after including the furnishings.

A top-floor duplex penthouse in the same 1922 building sold for $16 million in January 2024 and was also one of the top co-op/condo sales of last year.

Orinda-based attorney John Milani signed the lease for the buyers on the third-floor unit, NE Lafayette Trust, according to property records. Leases are used to grant use rather than deeds in co-op buildings, since the owner technically owns shares of the building and not the specific unit. The buyers were represented by Vincent Armando of Armando Investment, who did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Lucier and Stacey Caen of Sotheby’s co-listed the property and did reply to a request for further comment on the sale. When the home dropped its price last fall, Lucier told the San Francisco Business Times that the owners had spent more than $9 million on a 2017 renovation of the home. They bought the unit in the doormanned building in April 2014 for $9.7 million, according to Property Shark.

Though the sale is the highest price co-op or condo sale so far this year, there have been a few other notable trades in that market over the last six months. A three-bedroom, three-bath at 1 Steuart Lane sold for over $3,000 per square foot in November and the penthouse at The Avery sold for $11 million at the very end of last year.

There have been eight condos sold in the Related project in the first quarter, according to Related California president Gino Canori, the fastest pace in two years, which he attributed in part to return-to-office mandates.

He said he anticipated further condo sales as “people now know what the semi-permanent future looks like.”