YWCA Building in Downtown Oakland seeks highest bidder

The YWCA Building, an Oakland landmark designed by Julia Morgan, is for sale to the highest bidder.

Highbridge Equity Partners, based in the city, has listed the 67,400-square-foot building at 1515 Webster Street in Downtown, the San Francisco Business Times reported.

Brokers Ben Harrison and Will Cliff of Colliers, who hold the listing, said Highbridge is seeking the highest bidder.

The firm, which owns eight buildings including the historic Tribune Tower in Oakland, bought the YWCA Building in 2019 for $19.25 million.

The five-story building, built in 1915 for the Young Women’s Christian Association, includes a cornerstone that says, “Dedicated to Nobler Womanhood.”

The Renaissance-style building foreshadowed Morgan’s work on Hearst Castle, the Central Coast home of publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst.

It was designated an Oakland landmark in 1977 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.

Highbridge once had plans to convert the property into a 53-room boutique hotel, which is permitted under existing zoning, Harrison and Cliff said. Its plans had called for two restaurants, one on the roof and another on the street, and a second-floor event facility.

Now the real estate firm says it has taken the project “as far as we can given the state of the capital markets and the ability to get debt to do a project,” Highbridge General Partner Doug Abrams said in a statement.

Because of financial troubles, the Oakland YWCA subdivided the building in two parcels in 2000, then later dissolved and left the building by 2007.

It sold the top two floors to what later became the California College of the Arts, which used them as dormitories. The residential floors are now leased by Common, a New York-based co-living startup that rents out 66 units.

The three lower floors and the basement, which were sold in 2007, are now leased by Envision Academy of Arts & Technology, a public charter school. Both leases expire next year.

Highbridge is offering the residential and commercial parcels for sale either together or separately.

The historic YWCA Building was meticulously restored following damage from the 1992 Loma Prieta earthquake. Original fixtures – from its ornate plaster capitals to its gym floor panels to its lighting, sinks, toilets and radiators – were preserved.

— Dana Bartholomew

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