Seized by the U.S. Marshals Service earlier this year, which shouldn’t have caught any plugged-in readers by surprise, the four-bedroom, 5,100-square-foot Pacific Heights view home at 2755 Fillmore Street has now been listed with a $13,999,000 price tag.

It was back in April of 2018 that we tied the eye-popping sale of 2755 Fillmore Street for $13.5 million to Michael Lacey, the co-founder of Backpage.com, and two counts of money laundering with respect to the purchase of said home.  And as we noted at the time, the federal government was positioning to seek forfeiture of the Pacific Heights home.

26 thoughts on “Seized Pac Heights Home Listed with a $14M Price Tag”
  1. Fourteen million dollars for a house that is that cold and unwelcoming. Little to no curb appeal. I just don’t get it.

    1. “Little to no curb appeal” No kidding, it has one of the homeliest facades I’ve seen in quite some time.

  2. Who in their right mind would pay $2,750/sf for something with this little character? Especially in the current & foreseeable recession. I don’t even see this getting $2k/sf.

  3. TBK, watch “Ozark” (what else are you going to do at night?) for a very entertaining explanation of why people do seemingly irrational things when they launder money. Building or remodeling on spec is another classic ploy, since virtually every construction worker in the universe is delighted to be paid in cash, no questions asked. To do a first class job of it, you pay them a pittance via the regular paycheck system, and the rest in cash. The big pot dealers on the North Coast used to operate restaurant/bar/live entertainment joints with good food, and great prices. Naturally, the places were always packed. As long as the owner kept rowdies and teenagers away, the locals, including the cops, liked the jobs and tax money they generated, and left them alone. That gave the owner a great explanation for all those trips to the bank with duffel bags full of cash.

    And you’re right, the place is a sterile box in a mediocre location.

    1. Doesn’t splitting the P/R open one to charges of fraud, since the 941 – or 1099 if they’re a contractor – has to be sworn to as accurate ?? Whereas simply not reporting something seems more like an “oops!” excuse.

  4. Ozark comment is spot on. Unless someone else shows up needing to do the laundry this sells between 7.5-8.5 in 6 months. All it has is views, and some are at risk due to development.

  5. This is an bit of an odd looking house on a very steep part of Fillmore St. But on the plus side it’s got clean modern lines and spectacular views close to good private schools. It may not be prime pac heights but pretty close. This will be a great house for a family with school age kids and a 11-12M budget. Thats my guess. I don’t think it’ll sell for 13-14M with these market conditions.

  6. “on the plus side, it’s got clean modern lines…”

    Sterile white shoe box is a “plus”? This is just awful, and for this price one can get a real SF house in Pac Hts.

  7. Personal opinions architectural and design styles are just that personal taste. Sterile white shoe box vs old tired and cluttered. Grandma’s house. But at the end of they day our anonymous online opinions are irrelevant. The developers will design for the only opinion that matters – the buyers and their money.

    1. Well said. The opprobrium of SS commenter’s on “tasteless, sterile white boxes” is completely irrelevant because THEY KEEP SELLING and if they didn’t, flippers and designers wouldn’t keep building ’em that way.

      1. Right. And Bud Light remains a top seller despite plenty of more refined products on the market. Not everything on the market needs to be top notch.

  8. The premium is no doubt tied to those gorgeous views. And while many of you may find it sterile, I bet with a little better interior design, it’d be a lovely perch.

    1. And many of the commenters on this site will tell the ultimate buyer, years after the purchase when a new structure blocking said gorgeous views goes up, they were a fool for paying a premium for those gorgeous views, because “Your views aren’t protected“.

      1. These views seem fairly safe. The Hindu temple building is the whole corner lot and is 4 stories on its Vallejo frontage and has a pretty large lot coverage. The house next to it on Vallejo is already 4 stories too, so I don’t see near properties block the views from this house

        1. Sparky, what about the empty lot owned by the temple, right next to this house, which could be sold off by the temple or a developer who buys it. A 3 story house on that lot would transform this into a dull, house on a steep street with the only view being from the bedroom.

          See name link for street view.

          1. is it a separate lot? SFParcel doesn’t show that. But it could happen for sure.

          2. Not a separate lot. It’s the required rear yard for the temple which fronts on Vallejo street.

          3. The history on 2755 Fillmore, is that it was part of a larger vacant parcel that included the two lots up the hill that front on Broadway. All three houses were designed by Sandy Walker and built at the same time in the late 80’s.

          4. If Sandy Walker was the architect, it was surely one of his bad days, or it has been changed by owners. The facade certainly does not speak to elegant modern. There are many beautiful contemporary houses in the world and they are not white shoe boxes.

            Three thousand years of Western architecture and ornament is not “grandma’s house.” It is much cheaper to ignore all that, label it “clean lines” and market it to newly rich young computer-science majors. When they get adjusted to their wealth, they will look for more honest representatives.

          5. Yes, he designed it and it has been changed. Sandy Walker is a rather mediocre architect and a bit of a style meister. The house was designed in the 1980’s and your “Elegant Modern” was almost nowhere to be found during that era in new construction. The three houses were built on spec and 2755 Fillmore is the short sister of the two on Broadway. In order to preserve the views of the two houses above on Broadway, the height of this house was squished way down. Ten years ago the house sold (the sale is archived on SocketSite ,but for some reason won’t open or I would link it – editor?) and remodeled a number times inside and out with Walker per DBI.

  9. Up a steep hill (quiet), yet only 2.5 blocks to either Union St or Fillmore St shops. Incredible views. Plenty of parking. This is well beyond a “mediocre” location.

    As a frame of reference, a recently flipped 4,000 sf single family home in NOPA on Hayes St just went for ~$1,050 per square foot. With those views, and generally quieter, more desirable location, it seems to me it would get $1,500/sf minimum, and probably closer to 2,000. I think 9M is about right.

    1. I have no idea what it will go for, but I do know that they’re not making any more of those views.

  10. The Hindu temple itself could also be in play…a site this large would be very desirable for redevelopment.

    1. maybe, but it is still just zoned for 40 feet, so it isn’t going much higher. Would need to have a 25% rear yard too. The whole thing could be split into a few more SFH lots with some on Fillmore, demoing the temple, what have you. But then the current owner can bank on 10 years of the views while the permits creep.

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