San Francisco Real Estate Mogul Clint Reilly Dies

Clint Reilly, a longtime real estate mogul and philanthropist in San Francisco, has died at age 79.

Reilly’s death on Sunday was confirmed in a statement by his namesake Clint Reilly Organization, the San Francisco Business Times reported. Prior to his death, Reilly boasted $400 million in real estate and media holdings, including the Merchants Exchange Building and office properties in the city as well as the San Francisco Examiner, the Nob Hill Gazette and SF Weekly.

Reilly grew up in San Leandro and studied to be a priest for nearly a decade before founding political consulting firm Clinton Reilly Campaigns in the 1970s. During his time as a political player, Reilly worked on campaigns for Nancy Pelosi, Diane Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, going on to challenge incumbent mayor Willie Brown in 1999.

Reilly met his wife Janet while working for Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan when he ran Riordan’s mayoral campaign and Janet served as an aide to the mayor. They married in 1995 and moved back to San Francisco.

“The guy’s a genius,” Riordan told the Los Angeles Times in 1994. “He’s weird. But he’s a genius.”

Soon thereafter, Reilly pivoted from politics to real estate with the acquisition of the Merchants Exchange Building and later, several other commercial properties. Reilly continued to remain active in the real estate market up until his death, most recently unloading offices in the Financial District earlier this year at a per-square-foot price higher than many other properties sold in recent years.

In 1993, Reilly accused the executive editor of the San Francisco Examiner of physically attacking him in a meeting at the newspaper’s offices, leading to a lawsuit against editor Phil Bronstein, publisher William Randolph Hearst III and Hearst Corporation, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. In 2020, Reilly bought the Examiner and SF Weekly for an undisclosed price.

Reilly is survived by his wife Janet and their two daughters Jill and Ava.

— Chris Malone Méndez