A single-family home, a view worth a fortune, and a price that seems low for the neighborhood

This is “The Find,” an obsessive house hunter’s index of the four best San Francisco real estate buys of the moment.

Here’s a little secret you may have heard about San Francisco real estate: Summer is slow. 

If you go to an open house in August, you might notice it’s pindrop quiet; people are on vacation and don’t have real estate on their minds. For the savvy homebuyer, however, the lack of competition is a gift. While others are galavanting around Europe (or wakesurfing in Tahoe), it’s your time to strike.

Let’s see what deals we can find this week. 

Follow Market Street out of downtown, past the Castro, and the elevation keeps rising. (Same with the prices, usually.) You’ve found yourself in the Twin Peaks neighborhood, teetering just above Noe Valley. 

Here you’ll have some of the most spectacular views of the city, which you can appreciate from the large wooden decks (that’s right, there are two of them) on this modern, updated, 1,600-square-foot house.

Single-family homes tend to have multiple bidders and sell for higher than the asking price. But this home in particular has the potential for greater value — the large lot may enable construction of an in-law unit. During the high sales season, this home might ignite a bidding war — will the slow summer season change its fortune?

Think you could buy a burrito in San Francisco today at about the same price as it was in 2014? Hardly — but you can with downtown real estate. After years of stratospheric increases, some condos near the water are selling for around the same price as they did a decade ago.

Still, you’ll pay a premium for the views and luxury amenities. This 1,323-square-foot condo isn’t cheap, but it’s among the lowest-priced in the area for this combination of size and stunning views of the bay, in a building with a full-time concierge, pool and fitness center. Accordingly, the HOA fee is also not for the faint of heart: $1,230 a month. 

But the unit comes with a parking spot and is convenient to downtown offices or transportation to Silicon Valley. And should Downtown bounce back from its post-Covid doldrums, the value of these condos may very well bounce back as well.

Feeling baroque, anyone? The ornate home’s well-crafted features include a custom mural on the domed ceiling of the dining room and delicately painted wall moldings. The sumptuous feel extends into the marble-heavy kitchen. The combined effect is a sense of turn-of-the-century luxury in a Beaux-Arts building near Union Square, the Tenderloin and Nob Hill.

Listed at $729,000, it is priced on the lower end of two-bedroom units in the city. This is a tenancy-in-common, a structure in which you own a percentage of the building (similar to a New York city co-op), versus a condo, in which you own your unit and share of the common space. 

Traditionally, TICs sell for less than condos, partially because they can be difficult to finance unless all owners in the building are co-signers on a single loan. If someone in the building stops paying their share of the mortgage, the rest of the owners would be on the hook. 

These days, however, specialized loan products exist for TICs, so you are not necessarily liable if someone else in the building defaults on their loan. However, there is still shared risk, such as with property taxes, which must be paid in full regardless if one owner hasn’t paid their share. 

The unit has a $900 a month HOA fee and does not include parking — also a factor in the low price. But, again, have you seen those moldings?!

San Francisco may be the only place in the country where oceanfront real estate doesn’t automatically sell at an enormous premium. Blame the famously chilly weather of the Outer Sunset, which turns heat waves into winter blankets and ocean views into pea soup. 

However, that appears to be changing: Single-family homes in the Sunset and Richmond districts have seen enormous appreciation over the last decade as buyers choose to brave the fog for the relative calm of the west side. Still, condo prices remain lower than in more central neighborhoods.

Here we have a one-bedroom condo with an unobstructed ocean view. Sure, the view also includes a parking lot and the four-lane Great Highway, but if it didn’t, the price would be higher. People in Los Angeles or San Diego would be amazed that you can get a view of the Pacific at this price – they’re staring at the same ocean, after all, and paying twice as much.

The unit is 948 square feet — on the large side for a one-bedroom. The monthly HOA fee, however, is $946, which is on the high side for buildings that don’t have luxury amenities, especially for a one-bedroom. It costs money to maintain these buildings that are constantly buffeted by ocean air!

Rohin Dhar is a licensed real estate agent who lives in the Richmond. He has an MBA from Stanford and a weird portfolio of properties that includes an Earthship. You can find him on X, where he has a popular real estate account.