The Avenues run through the western parts of San Francisco and include the Richmond (north of Golden Gate Park) the Sunset (south of Golden Gate Park), and the Parkside Districts (also south of Golden Gate Park). The grid begins with 2nd Avenue and runs all the way to 48th Avenue at the western edge, just steps from the Pacific Ocean. Together, the Richmond, Sunset and Parkside districts comprise a large percentage of the overall area within San Francisco’s 49 square miles (our guesstimate is about 20% of San Francisco’s land area, using Google Earth to measure).
We’ll be counting down the Top 5 active listings for single family homes in the Avenues. We kick it off with number 5 on the countdown, 1330 4th Avenue. This 6 bedroom, 3 bath home is approximately 2,800 square feet, has a garage, and was built in 1910. The home is listed at $1,500,000 and took just 17 days to go into contract. The home remains in Active-Contingent status at this time.
1330 4th Avenue
To see the remaining homes, up to the most expensive listing, continue reading –>
Single family homes and condominiums are sprinkled all over San Francisco. But what about TICs, lofts, and stock cooperatives? We built some maps to show their geographic distribution across the City. Here’s a look:
A post we wrote the other day regarding the distribution of sales by price bracket triggered a couple of follow up questions, and we now have the answers.
Time to get nerdy
One reader wanted to see the distribution broken down by property type (single family home versus condo/tic/loft/coop). We were also curious to see what happened to the distribution when we limited the sales to Districts 1-9 only. We were able to handle both questions with this chart right here:
Distribution of Sales Districts 1-9 (click to enlarge)
You can see that the bulk of single family homes are sold in the $750,000 to $999,999 category, while the bulk of condos are sold one step down in the $500,000 to $749,999 category. It’s no surprise that single family homes command a higher price tag (generally) around the City.
Very few sales in San Francisco have the claim to fame that they sold for over $3 million. Matter of fact, we found out while writing this post that the $3 million plus category accounted for 2.64% of all sales in 2008 thus far.
Is there any activity in the high end?
But how has this category changed over time? Due to rumors circulating about activity in the high end of the market, especially over the last year or two, we wanted to find out. We looked at numbers of sales in this elite group dating back to 1995. Granted, there is inflation to account for, we still were interested in the trend and were particularly keen on looking at the time period from 2005 through 2008.
Duboce Triangle is a tiny but beautiful part of San Francisco. Classic Victorians line the lush streets. The flat, walkable neighborhood sits under a canopy and is home to the cute Duboce Park.
If you like trees, then Duboce Triangle may just be for you
We often get a kick out of newcomers who pronounce the neighborhood “Du-bot-chee”. To clear up any confusion for visitors and newcomers, it’s pronounced “Dew-bose”.
So what kinds of home price trends are we finding in the area? There are few sales within the neighborhood’s boundaries (due to its small geographic area), but we ran numbers anyway to see if we could at least identify an overall trend.
Have you ever been curious about how many properties sell within a certain price range around San Francisco? Well wonder no more. We have built the charts and are ready to show you the numbers.
Time to run those numbers...
But first, a little background on data gathering. We searched for all sales in the city of San Francisco ranging from January 1 through December 10 of this year (2008, if you haven’t caught on by now). We tallied up the number of sales in 13 different segments. The segments go from $0 through $249,999, $250,000 through $499,999, and onwards in quarter million dollar increments from there. We stop at $3 million and include all sales above $3 million in one category.
MLS currently shows a total of 4,210 sales of single family homes, condos, lofts, TIC’s, and stock cooperatives within the city of San Francisco for 2008 (thru December 10). Here is the distribution, and keep in mind, this is for all of San Francisco – from Bayview to Pacific Heights:
Distribution of 2008 Sales (click to enlarge)
For the pie chart and commentary, continue reading –>
What the heck is a pocket listing? A pocket listing is a home that is not being advertised to the general public through the MLS or a listing that will come on the market in the future but right now is still a secret. Many homes in San Francisco sell while off the open market, so pocket listing culture is a big deal. Every week, we’ll be sharing info about pocket listings that we know about. Information on pocket listings is sparse and secretive, so pardon us if we seem short on details for the purposes of our blog. If you are interested in learning more, you can click HERE to contact us. Without further adieu, here are this week’s pocket listings:
Out of our pocket and over to you
To see this week’s pocket listings, continue reading –>
Bernal Heights and Glen Park exhibit some very similar characteristics. We wanted to share with you how each neighborhood has performed over time, and thought the best way to do it would be a good old fashioned showdown.
Bernal and Glen Park, it's time to reveal those cards
The first chart we’re looking at shows median prices for single family homes, trending over the last 14 years. Here’s a peek:
Adding a little more fun to my spreadsheet-free day, I figured I’d put in this poll. Let us know what you think and feel free to submit your own annoying phrase. For you spreadsheet addicts, don’t worry, the charts and analysis will return tomorrow.
What is “The Shallot”? It is our version of “The Onion“… smaller but just as stinky. We’ve been knee-deep in spreadsheets lately, so it’s time we had a little fun.
In or On?
It happens all the time to people that live on San Francisco’s hills. Someone asks where you live and you reply, with a little stutter and hesitation in your voice as your brain fumbles around for the correct preposition to use, “I live in Nob Hill.” Really? You live in Nob Hill? How interesting. What, do you have a Hobbit as your next door neighbor? How are home prices doing in the Underworld?
It’s time to play Lo-Mid-Hi again! This time we’ll be showing you what your dollar buys in SoMa’s loft and condo market. There have been 157 condo and loft sales thus far (as of 12/8/08) and we’ll be taking you on a tour of the low, the mid, and the high sales. Here we go….
District 7 is one of the most sought-after areas of the City. Beautiful architecture, amazing views, shop-lined streets, and pricey homes all abound here. The neighborhoods in District 7 include the Marina, Cow Hollow, Pacific Heights, and Presidio Heights.
District 7 is home to Cow Hollow. Clearly, this Cow has been shopping there...
We were curious to see how condominiums have appreciated or depreciated over time in the district. We studied the median sales prices for condos in the district, dating back to 1995. We plotted the points on a chart to gain insight into the overall trend, and then figured out how much appreciation you would have gained/lost if you owned for X amount of time. Keep in mind that these are all based on the median sale price each year. With that said, here is a look at the data:
District 7 Neighborhoods - Median Sales Prices for Condos Over Time (click to enlarge)
The Sunset… it’s the largest district in San Francisco and is divided into 3 parts, Inner, Central and Outer. The district registers high on the cute-single-family-home factor. Ironically, the Sunset is known for its persistent fog.
The Sunset District (photo credit: Wikipedia)
Central Sunset shares many of the same characteristics with the Inner and Outer Sunset. Most of the housing stock was built from the 1920′s through the 1950′s on the streets’ perfect grid pattern. We were curious to see what median sales prices for single family homes have done in the Central Sunset over time. Here’s what we found:
We’ve been hearing a lot of talk lately about how the high-end of the real estate market is performing better than the overall market. But what about here in San Francisco? Some reports tout that the luxury market has remained relatively unscathed, while others say that there is a lag and it will soon be hit. We wanted to sample some neighborhoods around San Francisco so we could get a feel, not just for the high end of the market, but also for the middle and low ends.
Here’s what we did. The most expensive single family home to sell in 2008 (per the MLS) is in Pacific Heights. The least expensive single family home to sell in 2008 is in Bayview. The neighborhood with the highest number of median-priced sales (median is currently $835,004) was Central Sunset. These 3 neighborhoods are our three samples from around the city of the high, the middle, and the low end.
The results from our analysis?
How you fared if you owned your property for... (click to enlarge)
Here are some more shots of the Millennium Tower views. The Millennium Tower is San Francisco’s newest luxury high-rise… 60 stories of glass shooting high into the sky.
From a middle floor on the Southeast Corner (click to enlarge)
Looking down Fremont - Very NYC (click to enlarge)
