The Seligman Group has decided not to move forward with plans to convert San Francisco’s Humboldt Bank Building into residential units. Instead, the company will continue leasing the 19-story, 90,600-square-foot property at 785 Market Street as office space.
Forge Development Partners had previously proposed transforming the building into 124 housing units. That plan was halted after Forge was unable to secure sufficient financing for an equity stake in the property. The deal was expected to close last year but ended earlier this month when Forge agreed to terminate its exclusive right to pursue the conversion.
Richard Hannum, CEO of Forge Development Partners, commented on the challenges facing such projects: “Although the city has made extraordinary progress in trying to support conversions of existing buildings to housing, the equity markets for this remain challenging, resulting in delays in the process,” he told the outlet. “We expect to continue and eventually make this conversion work. But in the interim, the building needs to proceed.”
Seligman recently invested $4 million in upgrades for the Humboldt Bank Building’s elevators and converted its second floor into a tenant lounge. The group first acquired the building in 1997 and refinanced it with a $20.5 million loan in 2022; another refinancing is currently underway. Currently, about 40 percent of its space is leased.
This is not an isolated case among large-scale office-to-residential conversions being scrapped or delayed in San Francisco. A similar proposal by Forge for Wells Fargo’s downtown headquarters also failed earlier this year; that property is now under contract with Redco, which plans to maintain it as office space.
To date, only two major conversion projects have been approved by city officials—one being Forge’s proposal for 785 Market Street and another at 988 Market Street (the Warfield Building). The latter project would have created 40 homes but was abandoned after new owners opted instead for office and creative uses.
