Purchased as an older two-story, two-unit building for $1.3 million in September of 2014, permits to remodel and expand the Dolores Heights duplex at 3790-3792 21st Street were approved in 2016, issued in 2017, and the structure was then taken down to its framing (and then enclosed). Having passed... Read More »

Purchased as a little two-unit building at the peak of Potrero Hill for $720,000 in February of 2012, 882-888 Carolina Street was subsequently expanded and remodeled with permits for a two-unit project that were secured in 2014. While a number of complaints alleging “work beyond the scope” of the... Read More »

Purchased as a two-unit building for $831,500 in October of 2011, permits to remodel the two one-bedroom, one-bath units at 1566 19th Street and 395 Arkansas, on the north slope of Potrero Hill, were subsequently requested and secured in early 2012, followed by a slew of complaints. In addition... Read More »

Purchased as a vacant two-unit building for $690,000 in September of 2001, a permit to remodel the kitchen on the main/second floor of the rather lovely Victorian at 1016 Pierce Street was requested and approved in 2010. A bathroom remodel was permitted in 2011. And in 2014, an over... Read More »

Having completed a “Public Integrity Review” of the Department of Building Inspection’s (DBI’s) permitting and inspection processes, driven by a need to root out departmental fraud and a history of inappropriate activities, the Controller’s Office of San Francisco has identified the following weaknesses in the DBI’s systems, processes and... Read More »

While the former president of San Francisco’s Building Inspection Commission, Rodrigo Santos, has been indicted for bank fraud, as charged last year, the City Attorney’s investigation into permitting, inspection and contracting abuses within the Department of Building Inspection and SFPUC is still going strong. As we first reported back... Read More »

Illegally converted into a cannabis grow house early last year, with unpermitted electrical work and construction, a formal request “to convert” the former Bay Area Ironworks Suppliers building at 1440 Egbert Avenue, across from Laughing Monk Brewing in Bayview, into a “cannabis cultivation and packaging facility” have been drafted... Read More »

Having been flagged for the addition of an unpermitted in-law unit back in early 2015, the Excelsior District home at 68 Vienna Street hit the market in July of 2015, listed as a “fully remodeled” four-bedroom home with a “separate entrance” to the two bedrooms, two baths and big... Read More »

With the master lease to the San Francisco Art Institute, which had been using the building for student housing, having expired last year, and 52 of the 54 units, 27 of which had private bathrooms, having been delivered vacant, the former Abby Hotel at 630 Geary Street traded for... Read More »

Purchased as a “grand and totally vacant” 2-unit building, “with ample opportunity for expansion and renovation in a prime Presidio Heights location,” for $3.95 million in October of 2019, a permit for an “in kind only” and non-structural renovation of the 4,165-square-foot Victorian at 3665 Clay Street was approved... Read More »