What $6,600 rents in SF 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: $6,600.

First up, Noe Valley presents a “classic San Francisco top-floor flat” on Church and 28th Street. The classicality may refer to the building’s pre-1906 pedigree—or to the beautiful sequence of interior arches, high ceilings, and hardwood floors. The room count is four bedrooms and one and a half baths, but note that one of those bedrooms is actually the “double parlor living room,” which might serve as another bedroom for those looking to split the rent a little bit further—a classic San Francisco trick, indeed. That monthly price is $6,500; no pets allowed.

Speaking of classic San Francisco, what’s a more fetching piece of San Francisco history than the Oriental Loft Building on Delancey Street? This onetime warehouse inherited its anachronistic, uncomfortable moniker from its roots as an 1867 redoubt for shipping tea, silk, and rice. But it has also kept its history, landmark status, and spectacular interiors from that period. The two-bed, two-bath, 1,370-square-foot loft rents for $6,500 per month. The ad advertises a few updates like “custom light fixtures, track lighting, custom bathroom tiling,” and also “a ceiling fan”—the latter evidently so unusual in the building that it bears special mention, it seems. Moving in with pets would be another one for the history books, but the leasing agents don’t mention whether this is a go.

And, of course, a look at San Francisco’s historic housing stock wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the Presidio where a duplex with bridge views costs $6,500 per month. One of six homes originally built for senior officers stationed at the base, it comes with “roomy front porches for enjoying the view and an enclosed back porch for laundry and storage.” Since then the onetime officers’ homes have been divided to get more bang out of the scarce Presidio parcels, in this case yielding a three-bed, one-bath flat for $6,500. All pets are accepted here, which is handy as Crissy Field is just a quick jaunt away.

One can only imagine what future generations will think about things like towering East Cut condo towers in the style of Lumina when they too qualify as historic architecture. But in the here and now, what buildings like this one means is a $6,600 price tag on a two-bed, two-bath, 1,400-square-foot condo on the sixth floor and the promise of “a full service building poised to become the most desirable” in SF’s most luxe high-rise neighborhood. No word on whether those luxury attractions include animal companionship.

Last up is a “beautiful, large, spacious full-floor flat” in Hayes Valley. This ad says “the flat is comprised of three very large bedrooms, but the fourth bedrooms is a small den being used as a fourth bedroom, which has been the case with every tenancy in all the past years.” So with that tradition firmly ensconced, this one goes down as a four-bed, one-bath flat (note that it’s a split bathroom). The pad also comes with “huge windows,” “dark and solid hardwood floors,” and “unusually high ceilings” for $6,957 per month.