San Francisco Mansion Sells for Nearly Double Asking Price

For evidence of just how aggressive bidding wars at the top end of San Francisco’s market have become, look at a recent mansion sale in Cow Hollow.

A six-bedroom home at 2512 Union Street sold last week for $15 million, nearly double its roughly $8 million original asking price, the San Francisco Standard reported.

The closing price was about 88.7 percent above asking. That marks the largest gulf between asking and closing price for San Francisco homes above $5 million in at least 26 years, according to a Compass representative cited by the Standard. It’s second only to a Presidio Heights home that sold for more than double its asking price in 2000. Another property came close recently, with a home at 212 Spruce Street in Presidio Heights selling for 86.6 percent above asking at $8.2 million.

The sellers were Christine Russell, a great-great-grandniece of Levi Strauss, and investor Mark Schlesinger. The buyer of the 5,700-square-foot property was a Los Angeles-based LLC. The home traded just over two weeks after going up for sale, becoming the latest home in the city’s tony neighborhoods to be snapped up quickly, joining a mansion in Pacific Heights that sold this month after just a few weeks. The quick turnaround suggests an all-cash transaction, according to the Standard.

The sale is the latest sign that ultrawealthy buyers are battling over a shrinking pool of trophy homes in San Francisco. Inventory remains thin, particularly at the high end, even as demand rebounds sharply. This gap has been deemed a local “mansion shortage” fueled in part by wealthy buyers in the booming artificial intelligence sector moving into town. At the beginning of last month, there were only 835 single-family homes listed citywide, well below the roughly 1,100 typically available this time of year.

That scarcity has fueled a surge in overbids. According to Compass, 85 percent of San Francisco homes sold above asking last month, with the median sale closing 24.6 percent over list. The city also logged 26 home sales above $5 million in April, including four north of $10 million. All three of those figures represent new records for the city, according to the Standard.

Compass agent Nina Hatvany, who previously owned the home in the late 1980s before selling it to its longtime owners, told the Standard that buyers at this price point often prefer to outdo the competition rather than risk losing a coveted property. “If they aren’t that price-sensitive, it makes sense to make a bid that just blows the competition out of the water and secures them a house,” Hatvany said.

— Chris Malone Méndez