PACIFIC HEIGHTS
SAN FRANCISCO, CA
- Bedrooms
- 3
- Bathrooms
- 2
- Sqft
- 2400
- Sales price
- $4,405,000
THE SEARCH:
A decade-long client, priced out of the neighborhood's own market
Our clients weren't new to us. We'd worked with them on a variety of real estate needs over the better part of a decade, and by 2026 they were living in Pacific Heights, one of San Francisco's most premier and tightly held neighborhoods. A second child had just arrived, and they needed more space. What they didn't want was a new zip code.
Pacific Heights' competitiveness meant the practical path looked like a large condo. But like almost every buyer given the choice, what they actually wanted was a single-family home. Two offers on large condos came and went. Neither worked.
THE FIND: An off-market home with a catch
Rather than keep bidding into a thin, competitive condo market, we surfaced an off-market opportunity: a single-family home in the neighborhood our clients already called their own. It came with two complications that had kept it off the conventional market; the home was tenant-occupied, and even the property's own tax records didn't agree on how it was designated, raising use-history questions that needed real legal answers before anyone could move forward.
We treated the complications as the opportunity rather than the obstacle. We mobilized a legal team to work through the designation and use-history questions and to build a mutually agreeable path for the existing tenants to relocate, clearing the way for our clients to move in. Everything was structured and ready to go the day escrow closed, so there was no gap between closing and the tenants' transition.
THE CLOSE: $4,405,000
Listed at $4,500,000. Escrow closed June 3, 2026 at $4,405,000, $95,000 under ask. Because our clients were willing to work through the complexity that had scared off other buyers, they secured the home at a good price for the neighborhood. Three months later, they're finishing a renovation and looking forward to moving into the same neighborhood they never wanted to leave, in the home they actually wanted rather than the compromise the market was offering them.
