The “crown jewel of the Marina,” 3299 Baker Street is “directly across from the Palace of Fine Arts, with an Italian-imported upright brick façade, arched windows, wrought-iron balconies and plaques depicting scenes from Roman mythology.” And although it garnered a fair amount of attention when it hit the market for the first time since 1947 (and with a price tag of $6,000,000), yesterday the price was reduced by $200,000 (3.3%).
And while we have no reason to doubt the number of people that have declared, “I want that house,” this just might help illustrate the difference between desire (“I want”) and demand (“I will buy”) [more on this next week]. And not that you asked, but we happen to be partial to the house next door.
∙ Marina home leaves the light on [Examiner]
∙ Listing: 3299 Baker Street (5/5.5) – $5,800,000 [oboe.com] [McGuire]
Seems like all the big dogs on the district 7 block are taking a series of serious price reduction. Is 3% really going to make that much a difference to someone willing to spend $6M? What / when was the last house over $5M to sell in District 7? All these little price chops seem to chasing the market. These people should ask themselves why they are selling these properties, and then figure out why nobody is buying theirs at these price levels. I predict 2600 Lyon street will be the next property to take a reduction. I’d suggest knocking it down to $5.9 if they want to make a statement.
This will not sell with a 5 in front of it. Period.
It’s a pretty place and their original price was $1000 per square foot, something they could have easily gotten 18 months ago. The days of $1000 per square foot appear to be over.
I suspect this is going to be a big problem for sellers: you check what your place is worth, one or more realtors gives you an idea, you sit around and decide whether to sell, agonize whether you’d be willing to part with it at that price, decide to do it, then prep the place and by the time you do all that, 18 months have gone by and you can no longer get the price you agonized over. Not even close.
So the realtor now has to list it for the 18 months ago price, do all the work, and in the end, get the listing pulled becuase the owners never would have offered the place for sale for the current price.
A 3% reduction tells you they aren’t interested in selling it: they really have their heart set only on the $6M price.
Regarding the first post above, I assume you meant to suggest 4.9, not 5.9. It’s at 5.8 (down from 6) now. I agree: at 4.9, they’d probably get into a bidding war and the price would almost certainly go well over 4.9. Let the market decide what it’s worth. Chasing the market down 3% every couple of months isn’t going to get you there. But as I said, they really don’t care what the market is. They agreed to sell it for what the market WAS.
The firnishings are deadly. Don’t know if they belong to the current owner or if it has been staged but this house would show better empty.
Tipster, there is another house listed at 6.5M at 2600 Lyon that is also overpriced and not going to sell. I was suggesting a 600k price reduction to $5.9. There are 4 or 5 of these similar properties on the market now, all competing for the elusive buyer with a spare $6M and 80k a year in taxes. Good luck! I agree that a 200k price reduction is a joke. They paid 50k for the property and updated the kitchen in the 80’s. I’d say they have a little margin left to further reduce the price.
Can anyone tell me about the earthquake-worthiness of homes in the Marina? I’m not too, too familiar with the area, but I know that much (if not all) of the area is on landfill, and the Marina was hit hard in ’89. Should a potential buyer be concerned about this, especially considering this house is relatively old and brick?
Yes you should be concerned, BUT it may have been retrofitted and it may not be on landfill — not ALL areas of the Marina are on landfill. That information would be available in the disclosure, and of course you would have your own inspection done.
I’ve been in the property — it needs some work, as it seems most of the multimillion dollar properties in that part of the City do, by the way — but what a great location, great space, great views. I would totally by it if I had the money.
Oh, sorry eddy, you were clear and I was brain dead on the 5.9. I think that property came on at 8.1. It has a bizarre layout and a view that they had to obscure with a piece of art (nice try, but it looks wierd) to block out the neighbors house.
The Lyon house has location schizophrenia. If you cross the street and go up one block on Lyon, it’s one of the prettiest blocks in all of SF, and by far the best block in Cow Hollow. If you stay on that side of the street and go down one block on Lyon, the homes are cheap looking. The owner looks up and thinks he’s selling in 10M homes. The buyers look down and think they’re buying in a sea of $1.2M flats.
As for the marina, almost all of the land on that side of fillmore and that side of lombard/richardson is fill. That house is almost certainly on very deep fill. On the other hand, it *did* withstand the 89 quake. With a very few exceptions, the buildings that didn’t were buildings on corners with very wide garages, making them extremely unstable. This home *is* on a corner, but probably not the width of garage that would cause serious concern. But, on fill, one never knows.
Yes, the end apartment buildings in the “marina lagoon” area were hit the worst, mostly near Beach and Divisadero. The first floor clear story that were unbraced garages just collapsed when the wave came through and the building jumped up…I was in Moraga at college at the time and I had never seen anything so powerful. Oh well, I hope to buy in the marina too, still a great place to live, though at less than $1,000/sf!
Bottom line……..a home along the lines of 990 Green is always more likely to attract a large group of interested wealthy buyers more than something like Baker or that home on Washington……Of all the real estate “porn” (remember that catchy phrase) posted on SocketSite recently, that property, hands down, is the most amazing property on the market given its asking price. The views are REEE-diculous…..the floor plan and layout are sublime……and the area is fantastic….that little part of Green actually dead ends so you get little or no traffic in front of the building.
That green st listing was nice, but that’s a lot of scratch for no outdoor space and not a single family home. And the photos of that place make it look a lot nicer than it is in person.
The lack of outside space is more than made up for by its views. I was really trying to make a bigger point, and that is that the Baker and Washington homes, in my opinion, essentially just look like big ostentatious/garrish homes that don’t appear to be very functional or have any individual character (certainly more in the case of 3800 Washington). I think an argument can definitely be made that there numerous homes in very nice part of SF that are a quarter of the cost yet are still large and have their character and are not just a collection rooms with high ceilings and outlandish over the top finishings.
There becomes a point where liast the best feature of the homes is merely the fact of being able to say you paid $10,$15,$20MM for it. It’s a bad combination of having too much money and too little taste.
What a great house!
“If you cross the street and go up one block on Lyon, it’s one of the prettiest blocks in all of SF, and by far the best block in Cow Hollow.”
Not exactly relevant to the original post… but… this has got to be my favorite block in SF. Makes me feel like I’m in Italy or somewhere exotic.
If i had money, i’d buy this house too.
However, corner houses are generally tougher, as you feel you are always being looked at.