Imagine the first morning you wake up inside your new home in the Russian Hill neighborhood of San Francisco.
A robot with artificial intelligence arrives to bring you breakfast in bed. You feel good. The year is 2053.
You made the right decision.
Nearly 30 years ago, you purchased the three-bedroom, one-bathroom home on North View Court for well below its market value: just $488,000. But there was a problem: You couldn't move in for 29 years because a tenant had a long-term lease that lasted until the second half of the 21st century.
That's a possible future for anyone seriously interested in the Park North Real Estate brokerage's new listing.
Long lines formed to tour the occupied home, according to KFSN-TV. While it's unclear who the tenant is or how exactly they negotiated their 30-year lease, Park North said the homeowner recently died at the age of more than 100.
The tenant also pays well below market rent: just over $400 a month for the spacious home.
“The tenant's current lease appears to give them strong restrictions on the long-term rent amount, an unconventional method of rent payment, and possible occupancy rights through 2053,” the brokerage wrote in the listing. “The seller and listing agent do not guarantee access to the home and STRONGLY encourage buyers to review the seller's disclosure package/addend and consult with a San Francisco landlord/tenant attorney BEFORE making an offer.”
Douglas Lee, a real estate agent with Compass, said the San Francisco home is an ideal location for someone to “land bank,” meaning someone who does not intend to use or develop the property inside of many years.
“You sit back and wait until the tenant dies, vacates or the lease ends,” Lee said. “Once that happens, you realize a lot of your potential. It's a really good buy for trust fund people. If you buy it for your child who is zero or 1, in 18 years you will know that he will be ready to come true.”
The Edwardian house on the hill isn't the brokerage's only strange, cheap listing. The company is also filing what it called a “liquidation sale” of a $188,000 condo. The capture?
“The property is destroyed to the ground due to the fire. Excellent opportunity for a contractor, investor or homeowner willing to pay CASH. Be careful when viewing as there are exposed building materials. There is no access to the private terrace because the slider is damaged by the fire,” the brokerage wrote.
