Intended as a means by which to preserve “relatively affordable, existing housing” in San Francisco, Section 317 of San Francisco’s Planning Code was adopted back in 2008 and requires the specific approval of a Conditional Use (CU) authorization for the demolition or merger of any existing housing which is... Read More »

Purchased for $1.485 million in April of 2015, plans to “reconfigure,” remodel and expand the vacant two-unit building at 1369-1371 Sanchez Street were submitted to Planning and approved. Based upon the set of plans which was submitted to Planning, a building permit for the project was issued in September... Read More »

A special meeting between San Francisco’s Planning and Building Inspection Commissions is being convened this week. The topics of discussion: How demolitions in San Francisco are defined; the rise of fraudulent building plans designed to skirt San Francisco’s Planning Code and/or the Planning Department’s approval process; and the potential... Read More »

The proposed framework for eliminating San Francisco’s frequently gamed Tantamount to Demolition rule and instituting a new Residential Expansion Threshold will not be presented at the Bayview Hunters Point Citizen Advisory Committee Meeting this evening. And in fact, as of late yesterday, San Francisco’s Planning Department has formally suspended... Read More »

Attempts to game the real estate rules in San Francisco which govern the demolition and expansion of residential properties, by removing all but the façade or a few walls of an existing home and calling it a “remodel,” resulted in new legislation being adopted in 2007 that attempted to... Read More »