Construction Maison

San Francisco Supervisor Aaron Peskin has asked the city attorney to explore legislation to impose a vacancy tax on large property owners who leave residential and commercial buildings empty . During a supervisors meeting this month, Peskin said he continues to receive complaints about the impact of “ghost buildings” on neighborhoods. The problem is, nobody really knows how many vacant homes there are in the city and whether a vacancy tax would be legal or effective in freeing up much-needed housing. In an interview, Peskin cited a 28- unit apartment building at 1656 Powell St. that was vacated after a fire damaged some units in December 2013. It remains empty. The three-story building is in a prime North Beach location across from Washington Square Park . Four businesses on the building’s ground floor — a liquor store, a bar, a Thai restaurant and a seafood restaurant — are open, but the apartments above still have boarded-up windows and a littered lobby. Some work was done in the...

Take a walk east from the gold-plated cupola of San Francisco City Hall and the landscape transforms into the Tenderloin, a patchwork of residential hotels, small delis and social service clinics that cater to the poor. It winds into the city’s main tourist corridor , and, farther along, a glossy cluster of condominium towers where upper- story penthouses cost millions . These symbols of extreme poverty and prosperity are wedged together in District Six, which serves both as a portal for visitors and a cauldron where San Francisco ’s most pressing political issues simmer . For 20 years, District Six voters have reliably concluded that the solutions to those issues come from the progressive viewpoint. And while it’s more than a year until the next election for supervisor, the contest is already shaping up as a test of whether that is still true. From the Tenderloin to the Mission Bay waterfront , District Six has seen a rush of development over the past two decades, and residents are ...

caption Searching for an apartment? Look no further. source Vanessa Porter/Flickr Few web services will break you like Craigslist. It’s the go-to classified ads site for people looking to find an apartment, and yet, Craigslist’s visual clutter and chaos leaves most users dazed. Day one of my apartment hunt in San Francisco, I wanted to cry looking at the purple-and-white mess of listings. Then I tried searching Yelp on a whim. It’s the most tried-and- true recommendation site on the web, though typically reserved for restaurants and other retail operations. But using Yelp, I found a new apartment in less than two weeks. Here’s how I did it. For the last year I’ve lived in Oakland, a 35-minute commute from Business Insider’s office in San Francisco. It has a hopping downtown and quiet residential centers. source Melia Robinson/ Business Insider But my boyfriend’s commute to Silicon Valley proper cost him three to four hours a day. We decided to move to San Francisco to make both...

San Francisco Rose Amanda Donohoe at the Rose of Tralee Photo: Steve Humphreys " title=" San Francisco Rose Amanda Donohoe at the Rose of Tralee Photo: Steve Humphreys " width="499" height="342" /> San Francisco Rose Amanda Donohoe at the Rose of Tralee Photo: Steve HumphreysWexford Rose Juliet Sinnott wears wellies in the colours of Wexford. Photo: Steve Humphreys Becoming a Rose 'has helped heal Berkeley pain ' Independent.ie San Francisco Rose Amanda Donohoe said her late sister and cousin were "in the Dome" with her as she took to the stage in Tralee last night. http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/festivals/becoming-a-rose-has-helped-heal-berkeley-pain-36056302.html http://www.independent.ie/incoming/article36056249.ece/2253c/AUTOCROP/h342/II%20ROSE%20O%2026%20INT_ED5_S01%20INT_ED6_S01%20Read-Only.jpg Email San Francisco Rose Amanda Donohoe said her late sister and cousin were "in the Dome" with her as she...

Name: Allison Shiman Location: The Mission — San Francisco, California Size: not sure about the square feet Years lived in: 5 years, renting "I'm so excited about having my apartment memorialized on Apartment Therapy ," Allison tells us. She'll be saying goodbye to her beloved apartment soon...to leave on a trip around the world. "I have put so much effort and love in my little space that having it somewhere captured forever makes me so happy!" Loading Email Sign -Up Form... If the form doesn't load, you can try our mailing list page instead. Allison was unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately ) let go from her job. Rather than dive right back into the job hunt, she decided the best thing she could do right now is go on a world trip. But since her landlord doesn't let her sublet, Allison has to say goodbye to this cute place to make her traveling plans come true. Don't worry: all the lovely pieces in her home will be given to friends or sol...

I didn’t cry while searching for a San Diego apartment , but I came close. Moving to the city on a Sunday night, I had a five-day reservation at a Motel 6 and needed to find an apartment fast . I also had my 6-year-old tabby cat with me and a new job as real estate reporter for the San Diego Union -Tribune to start the next day. I was fairly confident I’d find a place quickly because in the last decade I had managed to get apartments in London, Chicago, San Francisco, New York City, rural New Jersey, Northeast Pennsylvania and, most recently, Monterey. Not only did San Diego turn out to be the most difficult, it made me change nearly everything I thought I wanted. My criteria was a one- bedroom apartment near the beach that allows cats, a rent of no more than $1,200 and was fairly close to work. To say the least, I stayed at the Motel 6 longer than expected. Ignorance of what neighborhood I was in most of the time was exacerbated only by a rental market that has seen prices increase...

There comes a time for most San Diego couples when they get sick of renting and, for the Whites, it came around the 40th birthday mark . Shawna White, 40, spent countless hours researching a place she and her husband Nathan, 39, could afford that wouldn’t break the bank. In addition to getting away from the region’s explosive rent hikes , they saw a home as an investment. Eventually, the Navy couple landed in Otay Ranch on the eastern fringes of the county near the border with Mexico. They bought a new 1,504-square-foot townhouse for $378,000, around $200,000 less than what something similar would have cost them closer to downtown. “We were able to buy something new instead of an older home with issues,” she said. “This was a good buy.” More and more new homeowners are being drawn to Otay Ranch, the largest residential development in San Diego County history at 25,000 acres. After being hit hard in the housing crisis , it has reemerged as a viable option for homeownership in a cou...

Apparently Brazil has very few extended bouts of cold, wet weather – even in their winter, which is, of course, right now – but one of them started just before our arrival. Sao Paolo had just gone 40 or so days without rain, and so many people welcomed it. Fair enough. From our side, we were hoping for better weather to discover Sao Paolo , but in the end we spent more time than expected catching up on work and schoolwork. Our Airbnb was very central – just a block from the famous Paulista Avenue . There are many, many pizzerias and sushi bars in Sao Paolo, probably a function of the fact the largest Italian and Japanese populations outside of their respective countries are in Brazil. At least that’s what I’ve been told. On our first evening in Sao Paolo – after getting in very late and getting driven to our appartment – we tried Brazilian pizza, and it was interesting… the cheese was on top, which appeared to be the principle difference, as far as I can tell. We went to the pizzeria a...

Susan Mall of San Francisco recalls how her late mother, Alyne Salstone, came to choose her oceanview Sloan’s Curve condominium. Her parents had previously resided at another South End apartment down the coastal road at The Ambassador. “When my parents first came to Palm Beach from Chicago, they lived at The Ambassador, and then the Sloan’s Curve (development) was built, and, my mother loved that location,” Mall recalls. >> PHOTOS: Oceanview Sloan’s Curve condominium at 2100 S. Ocean Blvd. After her husband, Milton, died in 1980, Salstone decided to make Florida her primary home. She bought an apartment in Sloan’s Curve. She ultimately sold it, and later bought the one that was her home until her death a year ago. “Over the years, she made many friends, and played lots of bridge games,” her daughter recalls. Mall and one of her brothers are now in possession of the condo at No. 307-S at 2100 S. Ocean Blvd. It has been put up for sale, priced at $1.345 million by agent Cristina ...