NNN Brokers USA – San Francisco Commercial Real Estate Brokers: "The Scoop"

Sure, Newsom’s new $6.48 billion budget includes layoffs and cuts galore, aimed at squeezing the city’s biggest budget deficit ever. Newsom says “there are not grand ideas” but it seems downtown is getting a little special attention. The budget specifically includes funds earmarked for repaving Market Street, as well as to grow arts programs and police presence in the area. He even announced the budget on Mid-Market, at the Luggage Store gallery. Is Mid-Market the neighborhood of 2009 and 2010? Well, sure, if it takes this long to get things fixed. [SF Appeal]

["SF Carnaval," via Flickr photog Kinh Tế Học.]

· Didn’t make it down to the Mission this weekend for the bacchanal? Check out SFist’s photo gallery for more shots of last weekend’s Carnaval. Warning, though, for those at work: butts abound. [SFist]

· Laura Beck braves Angel Island for a night — and you could too? [the Bold Italic]

· Randy Shaw sounds off on City Place, India Basin and what the hell is going on (or not?) at the Planning Commission. [Beyond Chron]

· Should landlords be doing more to protect you from identity theft? (Honestly we’d be happy if they’d just fix the garbage disposal.) [SF Appeal]

The decennial census yields some of the best (and some of the only) geographical statistics on neighborhood composition in America. But that doesn’t make it any less of a hassle to fill out that form — and any less creepy when the feds come a-knocking. A little more than a quarter of US households did not return their questionnaires this year, and the census’ follow-up operations are in full-effects across the Bay Area. And despite a multi-million dollar ad blitz, some residents are surprised by these tenacious door-knockers — and sometimes for good reason. We’ve been hearing some not so great things on the transom about census workers sneaking behind locked gates and camping out in front of difficult homes. We know this goes both ways, so we’re wondering what things are like for census workers out there too. What are the best and worst neighborhoods you’ve had the pleasure of working? Or have you been the victim of a tenacious fed? We want the dirt. Hit us up in the comments or on the tip line. Don’t worry, we’ll keep you anonymous. We don’t want another Yuba City on our hands.

· Census and cents [SF Gate]
· Yuba City police fatally shoot woman with shotgun [San Jose Mercury News]

Click the image above to view the full photogallery.

Then: $930,000
Now: $829,000
You Save: $101,000 or 11 percent

This 2-bedroom, 1-bath Noe Valley pre-earthquake Victorian has been on the market for nearly a year — this is actually its fourth pricechop in that time. The 1,175-square-foot unit is tricked out with Brazilian granite, maple flooring, stainless steel appliances and a rather lovely landscaped garden. But at $706 per square foot, it’s hardly the priciest abode in Noe — so why isn’t this one moving? Oh, right: maybe if you’ve got nearly a million to spend, you don’t want upstairs neighbors.

· 1107 Castro Street [Redfin]

That most infamous longtime suburbanite and city-critic C.W. Nevius has moved back to San Francisco proper with family in tow. Why, oh why, you might ask? Nevius has some adjectives for you, gentle reader. “It is better to spend your nights there, hear the traffic, the sirens, and the occasional tenor, crooning arias in an echoing alley.” Do we even need to say it? Okay, we’ll say it: Groan. [SF Gate]

[Via Parkmercedvision]

San Francisco’s biggest apartment complex is hurting. Parkmerced owner Stellar Management is currently down $550 million in senior debt on the 3,000-unit property, due in October, and another $52 million in secondary loans. That adds up to not much less than the $700 million Stellar bought the property for in 2005. Stellar claims to have since spent another $135 million renovating the properties and upgrading upstairs tower apartments into special-keyed “penthouses.” Oh, those heady bubble times, when the dirt and lease agreements were flying, and a $135 million renovation was a drop in the money bucket! But in the intervening years, citywide rents have fallen by nearly 10 percent, and it’s looking more and more difficult for Stellar to recoup those losses, let alone attract spendy potential residents to replace those pesky rent-stabilized ones.

The Times quotes one Parkmerced resident, Dorothy Lefkovits, who calls Stellar “probably the best manager we’ve lived under.” Considering this comment about Stellar cutting costs with garbage collection — that may or may not be aimed at those pesky older tenants — we’d love to hear from some of Parkmerced’s other 6,000 residents about their experience in Stellar’s suburbs.
· Owners Bet on Raising the Rent, and Lost [NY Times]
· Parkmerced Stumbles Toward Default [Curbed SF]
· Parkmerced Tells Tomorrow’s Story, Gears Up for Supersizing [Curbed SF]

Foreclosures are trending up, and the Bay Area is falling down. After years of relative safety in the market, high-priced homes are now being repossessed not infrequently: about 1,000 above $730K in the last two years, 223 of those just since January. But as anyone who lives in one of the most expensive cities in the country knows, a million dollars won’t necessarily get you all that much, and the accompanying Google map shows areas of high-priced distress in the relatively low-priced Civic Center and Mission. [SF Gate]

Following the unfortunate loss of editor Andy Wang, who is off to bigger and better things, I will be once again manning the helm at Curbed SF for the next two weeks. Keep sending us your best tips and photos about town, and I will do my best to dig up new Mid-Market gossip. — Susie Cagle

As we wrote when #401 hit the market in September 2008 asking $1,150,000: constructed as the Cape Horn Warehouse in 1892, and converted into the Cape Horn Lofts by Thompson Brooks and Pfau Architecture in 1997, 540 Delancey is…

[the missing 6's via Richmond SF.]It’s not always easy taking up residence in some of the city’s most storied real estate. Apparently things are even a little hellish for residents at the rather unappealing 6118-6122 California Street, the three-unit condo building that went up after the late Church of Satan founder Anton LeVey’s Black House was demolished. We were really hoping that the new residents would go all out, paint the place black and set up shop for LeVey’s second coming, but it’s nothing so exciting. Satanic believers still stop by the place to draw pentagrams, arrows and other symbols on the driveway in black wax, and to steal the three 6′s from the addresses affixed to the building (really, those 6′s were asking for it: who didn’t see that one coming?). Still, we won’t be satisfied that there’s really nothing devilish going on here until we see some interior shots.
· The Richmond District’s Satanic Past [Richmond SF Blog]
· Price Choppers!: Satan Goes Down at 6118 California Street [Curbed SF]
· Satan’s Lair For Sale: 6118 California Street [Curbed SF]