Market Notes
Market Notes
Data-backed notes on the San Francisco market, researched and written by Paulo Serna for the Level Up Group team: buyer strategy, seller timing, neighborhoods, condos and TICs, cash buyers, and the AI-era economy. New Market Notes issues drop about twice a week, built on the same governed MLS data as Level Up Market Intel. No hype, no fear.
Latest · Market Notes, Issue #22 · September 2, 2026
What a Bedroom Costs
Every search starts with a bedroom count, so here is the price of each rung: what a two, three and four bedroom home sold for over the last 12 months, in every district. Then the harder question. At the same square footage, is the extra bedroom worth anything at all?
Quick read: How much does an extra bedroom cost in San Francisco? Over the last 12 months the median two-bedroom house sold for $1,400,000, the median three-bedroom for $1,869,000 and the median four-bedroom for $2,700,000: the third bedroom costs about $469,000 and the fourth about $831,000. Condos climb a similar ladder, $730,000 for one bedroom, $1,350,000 for two, $1,900,000 for three. But hold the square footage fixed and most of that money disappears. Two, three and four bedroom houses all sell for about $1,130 per square foot, and at the same size a fourth bedroom sells for less than a third, not more. The one bedroom that pays for itself at a fixed size is the second bedroom in a condo. You are buying square feet and a floor plan. The bedroom count is the label.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #21 · August 30, 2026
The TIC Turn
Quick read: San Francisco's least understood way to own a home just had its best six months in years. Tenancy in common sales, the fractional-ownership flats most buyers skip past, closed at a median +5.8% over asking in the last six months, in a median 16 days. A year ago the same market closed at asking in 37 days. The share of TIC sales clearing asking by 10% or more nearly tripled, from 13.6% to 39.8%, and now runs ahead of condos at 29.6%. Ten years of data say this is not a normal spring: no year since 2016 posted a median market time under 29 days, and 2026 is running at 18. The product did not change: it is still the 1909-vintage flat with $450 median dues, selling at a 10% per square foot discount to condos. What changed is that buyers stopped skipping past it.
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Market Notes, Issue #20 · August 25, 2026
The HOA Line
Quick read: San Francisco condos look flat on average: +1.3% over asking in the last six months while houses ran +22.5%. Split the same condos by monthly HOA dues and the average falls apart. Under $500 a month, 59.9% of sales cleared asking by double digits, in a median 13 days. Over $1,000 a month, 11.1% did, and the most common outcome was still closing below asking, 39.9% of sales. The share roughly halves at each step of the dues ladder, and the pattern survives any way of drawing the brackets. The dues set the odds. The home decides the outcome.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #19 · August 18, 2026
What Cash Actually Buys
Quick read: National research says an all-cash buyer pays about 10 percent less for the same home than a mortgage buyer. San Francisco splits that answer in two. In condo country, cash does buy a discount, a modest one: in every price band under $3M the typical cash condo closed 1 to 7 points below the financed field, and a full week faster, 15 median days against 22. In house country the same money does the opposite: from $1.5M up, the typical cash house closed above the financed field in every band, 132.2 percent of asking against 125.8 in the $1.5M to $2M band. Cash there does not buy a discount. It buys the win, and it pays for it.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #18 · August 13, 2026
Cash Doesn't Chase
Quick read: Over the last 12 months, 30.9 percent of San Francisco house sales with reported financing were bought in cash, up from 24.9 percent the year before. But the cash is not where the bidding wars are. The five neighborhoods where cash is most common, led by the Financial District at 66.7 percent, all sold within about two and a half points of asking. The neighborhoods where buyers overbid hardest, the Outer Sunset at 30.4 percent over asking, Parkside at 27.4, run on mortgages: roughly three in four sales there carry a loan. The city's loudest bidding wars are fought mostly with borrowed money. Cash buys quietly, at the top of the price ladder, and it pays list.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #17 · August 9, 2026
The Overbid Map Is Not the Heat Map
Quick read: So far in 2026, 160 San Francisco homes closed at least a million dollars above asking, across 46 neighborhoods, for $231 million above list in total. That roster looks like a map of where competition is hottest. It is not. District 2, the Sunset and Parkside, has the highest typical overbid in the city at 32.7 percent and produced 11 of the 160. District 7, Pacific Heights and the Marina, is near the bottom of the city at 6.7 percent and produced 26. A million-dollar gap is mostly a fact about the price of the house, and at the extreme it is a fact about the list price rather than the market.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #16 · August 6, 2026
A Window Is a Memory
Quick read: On one afternoon, from one governed dataset, Bernal Heights houses sold at 135, 133, 131 and 123 percent of asking. The only thing that changed was how far back the window reached. That is not a flaw. Where the windows disagree, the market is moving, and citywide they disagree for houses and agree for condos. In 21 of the 23 neighborhoods with reliable reads in both, the 90-day figure runs hotter than the 12-month one. And short windows are not automatically noise: 30 of 90 subdistricts carry enough sales for a trustworthy 30-day read, and eleven of those are running five or more points away from their own annual number.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #15 · August 2, 2026
The Last Building You Can Live In
Quick read: An owner can occupy any small multifamily building, but a duplex is the last one where the unit you keep is still house-sized: a median 1,462 square feet per unit, against 1,218 in a triplex and 916 in a fourplex. This spring San Francisco buyers paid for that. Duplexes sold a median 11.7% over asking between March and late July, their highest in the eleven springs on record, after three straight springs at asking. Four-unit buildings, the ones an investor has to underwrite, still closed slightly under asking.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #14 · July 29, 2026
The Drought
Quick read: The whole city is a bidding war for one almost boring reason: there is nearly nothing to buy. San Francisco houses fell to 0.7 months of supply in June, about three weeks of homes on the market and the lowest reading for any June in at least twenty years. Condos, townhomes, and TICs all dropped to near record lows too, active listings are down about 40% in a year, and it is not interest rates.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #13 · July 25, 2026
The Pressure Valve
Quick read: The house frenzy is leaking into whatever lives like a house: condos in the house districts sold a median 14.6% over asking this spring, a ten-year high, TICs posted their strongest spring since 2018, and the downtown towers are back at asking for the first time since 2022, selling twice as fast as last year.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #12 · July 21, 2026
Why San Francisco Homes Sell So Far Over Asking
Quick read: You keep seeing it: sold for hundreds of thousands over asking, a million over asking.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #11 · July 17, 2026
After the Overbid
Quick read: The overbid story now runs one tier below the trophy core: Sunset and Parkside houses cleared 146.8% of list on a strong sample, while spillover stays observed, not proven.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #10 · July 14, 2026
A Million Over Asking
Quick read: The $1M-over-asking wave is real, but it is a trophy-house story in three districts, powered by cash and inflated by pricing.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #09 · July 11, 2026
The Mid-Year Mark
Quick read: At the 2026 halfway mark, houses posted their most competitive first half on record while condos stayed in the patient lane.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #08 · July 5, 2026
The Luxury Exception
Quick read: Over a full year the $5M+ top looks calm; in the last 90 days it heated up, and cash did the winning.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #07 · June 30, 2026
The Two-Speed Market
Quick read: Houses cleared about 124% of list over the last 90 days while condos held near 101%. Two markets, one city.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #06 · June 25, 2026
The Missing Middle
Quick read: The fiercest bidding wars are in the $1.5M to $3M middle, not at the bottom or the top of the price ladder.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #05 · June 21, 2026
Who's Paying Cash
Quick read: About a third of San Francisco homes sold for cash over the last year, and the share climbs with price.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #04 · June 17, 2026
The Spring Acceleration
Quick read: Houses sped into summer at about 123% of list with a median up roughly 26% in a year; condos held near 100%.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #03 · June 13, 2026
Where the Overbids Are
Quick read: Citywide, homes sold at about 103.6% of list, but that average hides a 33-point spread between neighborhoods.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #02 · June 10, 2026
The Condo Turn
Quick read: Compass's June report headlines another single-family record; the quieter story is the condo turn underneath it.
Read the issue ›Market Notes, Issue #01 · June 7, 2026
The AI-Era Spring Market
Quick read: One of the strongest springs in years, with the heat concentrated in houses and the cash-heavy luxury tier.
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For the short, current read on the market and the local economy, see the Market Pulse. To explore supply, competition, and prices by neighborhood, district, and property type, open Level Up Market Intel. Practical how-to guides live on the Resources page.
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