California condo prices plunge in San Francisco, worth less than decade ago

Despite recent signs that San Francisco is on a path to economic recovery, condos in the city are yet to make a comeback, as several sellers are still slashing their asking prices to try to attract reluctant buyers.

As of Tuesday morning, there were a total of 687 condos listed for sale on real estate marketplace Zillow in San Francisco. Of these, 87 had price reduction—over 12 percent of all listings. Vacation rental investor Rohin Dhar, who often shares Zillow listings with dramatic price cuts on social media, wrote on X, formerly Twitter, about a one-bedroom condo unit in downtown San Francisco; it was recently sold for $680,000, down from the sum of $825,000 it fetched when it was purchased in 2015.

“As condo prices have declined in downtown San Francisco, one bedroom condos have been hit particularly hard,” Dhar wrote on the social-media platform. “Are you generally just better off renting than buying a one bedroom apartment?”

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The Zillow listing shows that the asking price for the property, which was sold on August 7, was reduced four times by the seller since the property was put up for sale in May this year for an initial asking price of $750,000—already much less than its 2015 price. The condo was built in 2009, and homeowner association (HOA) fees are $707 per month.

Dhar shared the listing for another one-bedroom condo unit in downtown San Francisco, which is now being sold for less than it fetched in 2005—about two decades ago. The 618 square feet condo at 260 King Street was sold for $505,000 in November 2005; 10 years later, in June 2015, it was sold again for a higher sum, $615,000; and in 2018, it was purchased for an even higher $670,000.

Now the condo’s seller is trying to get significantly less for the unit. The condo was listed in February for $579,000, and since then, has seen three different price cuts. On August 1, the asking price was lowered to $498,000, but the unit remains unsold. The condo was built in 2004—which means it is 20 years old—and HOA fees are $980 per month.

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Condo prices in San Francisco have seen significant drops since the pandemic, as the city faced a mass exodus of workers, especially in downtown, as well as office and retailers’ closures. Between February 2020 and February 2024, San Francisco’s condo values plunged by 12.8 percent, according to Zillow data, from $1.14 million to $997,000.

While some condo owners are still slashing listed prices and office buildings remain vacant, there have been reports that the situation is starting to change in San Francisco.

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Patrick Carlisle, chief market analyst at Compass, recently told the San Francisco Chronicle that the city’s condo market will face a significant rebound this year, pointing at his company’s data showing that the median price of a condo rose by 5.6 percent between December 2023 and February 2024 compared to the same stretch of time in 2022-23.