What $6,500 rents in San Francisco right now

Welcome to Curbed Comparisons, a regular column exploring what you can rent for a set dollar amount in different neighborhoods. Is one person’s studio another person’s townhouse? Today’s price: $6,500.

You can always spot a neighborhood on the rise by how quickly the bedroom count dwindles at the same price point relative to competing burghs. Not that this condo in Mission Bay, located at 1000 Third Street, is by any means a microstudio; in fact, according to the ad, it’s over 1,100 square feet and packs two bedrooms and two baths. Still, for a cool $6,400/month, it’s fairly compact compared to competition, playing up the Mission Bay local and proximity to the East Cut and ballpark areas to make up the difference. The one thing this is not a prime locale for: pets.

Consider what slightly more money—$6,500/month—nets out in the Outer Richmond instead: Three beds, three baths, and over 2,300 square feet, all in a detached single-family home on 38th Avenue. Planning Department records date this place to 1923, but like most Craigslist listings these days, the ad marks it as “newly renovated,” with all three bathrooms recently overhauled, and a “newly installed solar system” thrown in as well. There’s also a garage and a backyard, though the latter is “currently being landscaped” and not pictured here. This deal does not include pets, or at least makes no specific mention of them.

For a more relaxed and welcoming pet policy, look to Russian Hill, where $6,500/month rents a two-bed, two-bath, 1,450-square-foot flat on Lombard that both cats and dogs can call home. This is the middle unit in a triple, with “beautiful hardwood flooring throughout” and “balconies in the living room” plus access to the roof deck to consider the advertised “panoramic views.” This is another furnished place, so hopefully both renters and pets enjoy the tasteful decor.

Speaking of exclusivity: According to our highly unscientific twice-weekly sampling, more and more Millennium Tower condos are leaning into the prospective rental market. Here’s yet another, but this one plays it coy by not mentioning the tower by name in the headline or even until the second to last sentence of the ad. In fact, the ambiguity of the phrasing—”full amenity building at Millennium Tower”—leaves it unclear whether this is part of the main tower, which suffers from the infamous structural sinking, or part of the attached podium building. The thing that’s very definite here is the price ($6,400/month), the offerings (just one bed and one bath). Pets are up in the air here.

Finally, the winding courses of Forest Hill provide another full house for $6,500/month, this one a detached three-bed, two-bath, 1,750-square-foot home on Ninth Avenue, packed with a two car garage, “landscaped yard,” and “brand new carpets and padding in all bedrooms.” Still no mention of pets; it’s a dog-eat-dog world sometimes.