The City of San Francisco released a Request For Interest to identify office building conversions that city officials could help expedite with zoning changes, regulatory measures, and financial incentives.
The city’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development and Planning Departments are seeking responses from downtown building owners and sponsors on proposals to convert underused commercial space into housing or other uses. The announcement identifies “office-to-housing” projects as a particular interest, but responses may include conversions of non-residential floor area for other uses.
This is San Francisco’s latest step in an effort to revitalize its downtown in a post Covid-environment where office space is underused while formerly downtown-based employees work from home part-time or full time.
The city recently sponsored a study on how to boost vitality in its financial district. The panel that undertook the study offered recommendations including:
- Creating downtown destination zones through ground-plane activation to help transform public spaces and empty storefronts into city attractions.
- Reducing and restructuring businesses taxes, including the gross receipts tax, commercial rents tax, CEO tax, and transfer tax.
- Providing incentives for office-to-residential conversions to tackle the housing shortage.
- Offering other incentives, such as impact-fee waivers and property tax abatement, as well as reducing zoning and building code barriers to adaptive reuse projects.
City officials are also working on an adaptive reuse roadmap for architects, builders, and developers to adapt projects to current building codes and planned revamped codes.
Related Stories
Wood | Oct 19, 2018
Design revealed for mass-timber residential tower in Milwaukee
The developer is confident that the city will approve construction, which is scheduled to start next year.
Mixed-Use | Oct 15, 2018
35-story mixed-use tower will be tallest residential building in Long Beach
Studio One Eleven designed the tower.
Multifamily Housing | Oct 10, 2018
Affordable treasures
This year’s prestigious Gold Nugget Awards honor four projects that provide affordably priced housing for homeless families, seniors, and veterans.
Multifamily Housing | Oct 9, 2018
Breaking new ground: The New Home Company
The company, which is headquartered in Aliso Viejo, Calif. relies heavily on focus groups and market research to understand buyer preferences specific to each new community.
Multifamily Housing | Oct 9, 2018
Bjarke Ingels Group creates 66 homes for low-income citizens in Copenhagen
The building is approximately 73,000 sf.
Mixed-Use | Oct 4, 2018
Four-story hotel and adjacent affordable housing community opens in California’s Sonoma County
Axis/GFA Architecture and Design was the architect for the project.
Multifamily Housing | Sep 25, 2018
Fitness centers go for wellness
Equipment choice, room size, program offerings—a lot of thinking has to go into creating a fitness facility that pays off in resident satisfaction.
Multifamily Housing | Sep 24, 2018
Topsy-turvy: Creative use of air rights results in a model of urban luxury design
Using bold cantilevering and imaginative structural design, ODA and its project team created a 12-story building whose massing grows in width as it steps upward.
Multifamily Housing | Sep 21, 2018
A place of ‘voluntary and cheerful resort’
A project team soldiers on in the wake of a nightmarish turn of events.
Multifamily Housing | Sep 19, 2018
Multifamily market trends 2018: What the experts are saying
The growth of keyless entry solutions and demand for oversized units are among the trends and ideas shared at Marcus & Millichap’s 2018 Multifamily Forum in Chicago.