SF tower condo surge

A 56-story condo tower near Salesforce Tower is selling again as downtown San Francisco draws back more office workers and weekend visitors. (bizjournals.com) The building is The Avery at 488 Folsom Street, a 56-story project completed in 2019 with 118 condos on the upper floors, 280 market-rate apartments, and 150 affordable apartments below. Related California says the tower has 548 homes in all and sits two blocks from the Transbay Transit Center. (relatedcalifornia.com) San Francisco’s office market has improved in early 2026, with more than 3.4 million square feet of leasing in the first quarter and nearly 800,000 square feet of positive net absorption, according to Kidder Mathews. The firm said demand has centered on newer, well-located buildings, especially from artificial intelligence and technology tenants. (kidder.com) Downtown activity is recovering unevenly rather than snapping back to a five-day office pattern. Downtown San Francisco Partnership said weekday foot traffic in the Financial District and Jackson Square is still about half of 2019 levels, while 2025 weekend visitation reached 75% of the 2019 baseline on Saturdays and 72% on Sundays. (downtownsf.org) Transit data shows the same split. The San Francisco County Transportation Authority said weekday office attendance was still below 50% of pre-COVID-19 levels by the end of 2024, while Muni recovered to nearly 74% of pre-pandemic weekday ridership by the first quarter of 2025. (sfcta.org) The rebound at one luxury tower does not mean San Francisco has restarted housing production at scale. The Planning Department’s pipeline report says the city still has tens of thousands of homes in projects that have been filed, entitled, permitted, or started but not completed. (sfplanning.org) The city’s own housing reports have warned that zoning capacity and actual construction are diverging. A 2025 economic analysis projected that San Francisco’s broad rezoning plan could allow about 39,000 additional homes in western and northern neighborhoods, but under optimistic modeling it would yield only about 14,600 new units because financing and construction costs remain high. (kqed.org) Planning data also shows the pipeline is a moving queue, not a guarantee of cranes. The department says projects remain in the pipeline from initial filing through entitlement, permit approval, and construction, and they are removed only after final completion or after some units receive temporary occupancy. (sfplanning.org) City officials have been trying to unlock more feasible sites through corridor rezonings and broader rule changes as state housing deadlines approach. San Francisco is required to make way for 82,000 homes by 2031, and KQED reported last year that the city risked losing state funding and some local control over housing approvals if it failed to adopt a compliant rezoning plan by January 2026. (kqed.org) The immediate picture is two-track: buyers are returning to select downtown towers, while much larger housing production still depends on lower costs, workable financing, and projects actually moving out of the pipeline and into completed buildings. (bizjournals.com, sfplanning.org)