2632 Mission Street Site

Demolished following a five-alarm blaze back in 2014, plans to construct a five-story building with 16 condos over nearly 8,000 square feet of new retail space on the site of the former Big House store at 2632 Mission Street have been drafted by Gabriel Ng + Architects and submitted to the City for review.

2632 Mission Street Rendering

That being said, the un-entitled site is also being shopped for $5.888 million, which would suggest the current owner isn’t actually planning to develop the Mission District parcel anytime soon.

But plans to redevelop the parcel four doors down are in the works as well.

20 thoughts on “Big Plans for the Burned-Out Big House Site”
  1. Ah, yes, here we have visual proof of the gentrified Mission District. Notice all the fine new buildings set among the historical treasures that have been preserved. It is easy to see why the leftists want to preserve what is left of this precious area.

      1. They are leftists, who try to label themselves progressive. Real progressives are people like Teddy Roosevelt, Eisenhower and LBJ.

        In municipal government, real progressive politics has been practiced in Minneapolis-St Paul, over many decades. Theirs is “good government” without the SF leftists’ inclination to the taking of private property, and excessive control over planning. We should send a delegation to visit them. It is not another country.

  2. $5.8M for the lot, but any idea of the insurance payout after the owner set the old building on fire?

    1. Sabbie, insurance companies are in the business of making money, not paying out claims. Do you think they make their billions by paying out bogus claims, dear? No.

      Trust me, even legitimate victims of misfortune get their claim scrutinized and investigated (and in some cases denied), so no one who committed arson with a “get rich quick” scheme is going to pull one over an insurance company.

      I know in your fantasy-land world it is just super-easy to commit arson (and if someone dies, murder) and then walk away with a big insurance payout, but that is not how reality works.

      Insurance fraud is a felony, as is arson. If you have proof of a crime, then you have an obligation to report it immediately to the police. Otherwise, take your medication and stop posting nonsense.

      1. What is said above is true. As someone who has been through a few fires, Insurance companies use third parties to adjust claims (contractors etc). The owner has some ability to bid against these and negotiate but not much. Generally the adjustments are very accurate as for loss of rent and cost to rebuild the structure, as said above Buffett didn’t become filthy rich by running insurance co’s in the red.

  3. Mission Street needs some major redevelopment. No reason you couldn’t put up 5 story buildings (or higher) all over. And yes, there aren’t lot of buildings worth preserving.

    1. I agree. I think locals need to get over their low-rise fetish and move into the 21st century.

      With its abundance of existing amenities and transit, and with the demand clearly there already, the Mission is easily one of the best locations in the city, if not on the whole West Coast, for new high-rise construction.

      While economic displacement is clearly bad, and cultural preservation is clearly good, I think we’ve long past the point where personal aesthetic taste alone is an acceptable justification for limiting the height and mass of new buildings.

      1. “low-rise fetish”, ahh — what a nice way to disparage people who care about their community. Not everyone loves Manhattan.

  4. Isn’t New Mission city, next door, shut down? I wonder if there is the opportunity to combine a couple parcels on the block and build a really significant new structure.

  5. Five floors fronting a street with the Bay Area’s only real rapid transit line doesn’t seem very big at all.

  6. 1 million for each site, to the left and right and you may even bump it to 2 million depending on the un-appraised value…

    eminent domain the whole block, and build essential housing for the community……

    1. perhaps you don’t realize that eminent domain is no longer a tool that can be used for private development in California. Redevelopment is gone (plus…the Mission was never a redevelopment area anyway).

      1. Your are incorrect. Eminent domain can still be used for any purpose that serves the public good, and economic development is one of them. The California redevelopment agencies were abolished, not the ability for cities to directly do the same thing they used to do through redevelopment agencies. What they can no longer do is create a redevelopment authority to use tax-increment financing (TIFs) to finance redevelopment. However, they can still give tax abatements and other subsidies. Moreover, municipalities can create infrastructure financing districts (IFDs), which can be used not only to build public infrastructure, which could be used to serve a private development, but they an IFD can even directly finance low and moderate income private housing development and also any type of private industrial project. Also, IFDs have the same eminent domain authority that the old redevelopment agencies had.

        So, no eminent domain has not been eliminated as a tool for private development.

    2. That is not practical IMO.

      The answer, IMO, is to restrict the footprint of buildings in this area, and much of SF. Forcing developers to assemble larger parcels – which might preclude putting up 9 story or whatever buildings on 25 foot lots. Hemmed in by other such lots and forced blank, featureless lot line walls which SF has too many of already. Way too many.

      Now there is an idea for a ballot initiative.

      1. I’ve always felt the opposite. The tall, narrow buildings of the older parts of the city make a much more interesting and varied street than the megablocks of Mission Bay.

        I don’t like featureless lot line walls either, but I think it’s safe to say that the other buildings around there will be redeveloped in due time.

        What does “restrict the footprint” mean, anyway? Mandating a bigger back yard?

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