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Shifting Away From San Francisco, Residing in Chattanooga, Tennessee

Daily SF News — Sun, 16 Jun 2024 10:05:20 +0000

Angle-down symbol A symbol in the shape of an angle pointing downward. Jesse Rosenthal and Rachel Pohl traveled around the United States for about a year and now live in Tennessee. Courtesy of Rachel Pohl

Rachel Pohl and her husband left San Francisco and traveled around the USA for about a year.
When Pohl became pregnant, they finally began looking for a place to settle down.
They thought Durham, North Carolina, would be the answer, but Chattanooga, Tennessee, ultimately became their home.

San Francisco is home to the Golden Gate Bridge, the setting of the television series “Raven's Adventure” and “Full House,” and a strong professional and business services workforce.

It's also an expensive city, with more people moving away from it than moving to other parts of the United States.

Rachel Pohl, 34, who lived in San Francisco for several years, and her husband Jesse Rosenthal are just two of the people who left. After traveling around the U.S. for about a year, they are happy to have settled in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Pohl said that although she was also happy in San Francisco and enjoyed life there, at her current stage of life she is “grateful to be able to call Chattanooga home.” She and her husband moved to the city of more than 180,000 residents in late 2021.

They had been considering moving away from California for some time before leaving San Francisco in the fall of 2020.

“Obviously, it's very expensive and difficult to buy a home and raise a family,” she said. Pohl said they also wanted to live closer to family and be somewhere where life was “slower” than the more hectic big city of San Francisco, which is home to over 800,000 people.

“I think the overall situation and quality of life there is more difficult than in smaller or medium-sized cities because of the cost of living,” said Pohl.

The California wildfires in August 2020 were another reason for the couple's decision to leave the country. “It was around that time that we thought, let's leave California. It's time,” Pohl said.

“A great nomad tour through the USA”

During the pandemic, the pair were able to leave San Francisco thanks to flexible remote work and decided to explore the country, see the sights and decide where they would settle. “We went on a big nomadic tour of the USA,” Pohl said.

They packed up their things and moved some items to storage. Pohl said goodbye to the city she had called home for years and where she had met her husband. The two set off for Airbnb accommodations across the US.

Montana was one of the states they visited. Chattanooga was another place they saw on their trip and she found it “very beautiful and lovely.”

“It was spring and the flowers were blooming and I thought, 'This is a beautiful place,'” she added. She and her husband moved on, but after about a year of traveling, they finally moved there because they were looking for a permanent place after learning Pohl was pregnant. Pohl said she and her husband liked the size and energy of Chattanooga.

“It seemed to me that for the size of the city there was enough and plenty going on, but not overwhelming,” she said.

In the summer of 2021, they landed in Durham, North Carolina, before leaving Chattanooga, in part because of the potential job opportunities there. But Pohl said the place just didn't appeal to them.

“We thought if we could choose any place in the U.S., we just wanted to love it and feel comfortable with our decision,” Pohl said. “So we decided then to return to Chattanooga. We hadn't been there since the spring.”

The family-friendly location and other advantages of Chattanooga

Pohl likes the access to nature in Chattanooga.

“We like to hike, go river walking and paddle,” she said. “We like to take our son to playgrounds and parks. It's all very accessible.”

Pohl said people in Chattanooga are also friendly and she considers it a family-friendly place. She has also found that people are more diverse when it comes to jobs, in contrast to the dominance of the tech industry in the San Francisco area.

“I met entrepreneurs in the food and beverage industry and people doing all kinds of things,” Pohl said of Chattanooga. “It felt approachable and accessible here to do that.”

Chattanooga is also much more affordable for homebuyers than San Francisco. According to Realtor.com, both San Francisco and Chattanooga are currently buyers' markets where “the supply of homes exceeds the demand for homes.” While that may be the case, Realtor.com also shows that the median sales price for homes in Chattanooga is well below the national price in San Francisco – $347,500, or about $1.1 million.

“It's just a lot easier to buy a nice, bigger house in Tennessee and Chattanooga,” she said. “You can go a lot further with your money here. We thought about buying a house in California, but in the end we thought it didn't make sense because of the cost, because of the distance from family and just the whole situation. We thought let's move there.”

Although Pohl is happy in Tennessee, she misses the cuisine in San Francisco and access to some of the national parks nearby. Pohl told BI that she has visited San Francisco since moving away, mostly for work. And while she loves the energy in Chattanooga, there's something special about the energy in California, too.

“It's such a beautiful state,” Pohl said of California. “Sometimes I miss the energy a little bit, but I feel like that was an active part of my decision to move away from the big city, but there's so much innovation there around technology and AI. From a professional perspective, I miss that sometimes.”

Have you moved from San Francisco or anywhere else in the U.S.? Contact this reporter at mhoff@businessinsider.com to share your moving experience.

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SF Is Shifting Folks Dwelling on the Road Proper Into Empty Properties. Right here’s Why It Can’t Go Quicker

Daily SF News — Mon, 03 Jun 2024 20:59:21 +0000

BWhen the Street to Home program was quietly launched in San Francisco last summer, it was intended to address two homeless problems at once.

It puts people living on the streets directly into housing, bypassing a long — and for some, controversial — referral process and waiting lists, and fills vacant apartments funded by the city, reducing a vacancy rate that has drawn the ire of some city officials and advocates.

Nine months later, the Street to Home programme, which was the first The freshhas been taking six to eight people off the streets and giving them homes each month, according to the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH), and is doing well.

There are also restrictions that prevent an early expansion, but officials say that's OK; the lessons learned will help speed up the placement of people in more than 9,000 assisted living units, including emergency shelters and other transitional housing.

“The goal is not to make Street to Home a huge program, but rather to use the lessons learned so that everyone in the housing process can benefit from an expedited process,” said Emily Cohen, HSH's deputy director of communications and legislative affairs.

With thousands of people living on the city's streets, authorities are under legal, economic and political pressure from many quarters. Businesses and residents are suing over street conditions, the legality of “citizen sweepers” has reached the U.S. Supreme Court and the actual number of homeless people is likely higher than the 7,754 reported in 2022. (In that report, HSH acknowledged that as many as 20,000 people in San Francisco may experience some form of homelessness each year and that there are four homeless people for every person or family that gets a home.)

The city has just conducted a new count; the final results are expected this summer.

There is a certain group of people for whom it becomes more difficult to find space if you put up any kind of barrier.

Chris Block, Housing and Accommodation Team Leader in the Homelessness and Supported Housing Department

The program's sole housing provider, Delivering Innovation in Supportive Housing (DISH), says 58 people have moved into its permanent supported housing units — typically larger buildings like the Minna Lee. Supported housing units include on-site services that can include health care, job training, food assistance and more.

The steady flow of new arrivals is just a fraction of the thousands of people living on San Francisco's streets, but there's also this promising number: One. That's how many people have moved out so far, according to DISH Director Lauren Hall. Cohen said she expects Street to Home's turnover rate to be higher than the systemwide rate because participants move in directly from the streets, but it's about the same.

“I'm really pleased that there is no more turnover in this matter,” said Jennifer Bolen, parliamentary assistant to Sup. Dean Preston, who last year called on HSH to halve the vacancy rate within 90 days; his fellow board members unanimously supported the non-binding resolution. “This means that people are being matched with apartments that suit them and that they would like to stay in.”

The Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing said it has reduced the vacancy rate in assisted housing to 7.1 percent thanks to the Street to Home program and other measures. (Courtesy of HSH)

According to the agency, the program is responsible for more than a quarter of the roughly 200 vacant units HSH has occupied since May 2023. The vacancy rate has been a political flashpoint for years. In 2021, then-Sup. Matt Haney and others called for a hearing when the rate rose to 10 percent.

Not all units classified as vacant are available. Around 40 percent were recently unavailable due to repairs and other reasons.

Last year, Preston introduced its resolution three months after HSH quietly launched the pilot program. The vacancy rate has since fallen to 7.1 percent, which HSH officials attribute not only to Street to Home but also to other initiatives, such as a dedicated housing placement team and the allocation of more money for capital improvements to the housing stock.

A faster choice

Here's how Street to Home works. HSH's outreach team, which has closer contact with people on the streets, identifies those who are eligible and ready to move in. Because the program only includes a limited number of buildings, participants don't have much choice in choosing their housing unit, unlike those who participate in the general referral process. “This hasn't been a major problem so far,” an HSH spokesperson said by email. “We find that most clients are very happy to accept the housing offered to them.”

Once they've toured the apartment, move-in typically takes about a week, according to Chris Block, who leads HSH's housing and placement team. On-site case managers then help residents gather paperwork within 90 days. “There's a certain group of people who have a harder time finding housing if we put any kind of obstacle in their way,” Block said.

Hall thinks Street to Home is a success and plans to participate until DISH's assisted living units are full. But she also acknowledges that it can be “exhausting” for her staff. As HSH's Cohen noted, there are additional challenges when participants come straight from the streets. For example, residents have to pay rent; until recently, they received no help setting up accounts before moving in. But HSH now sends a staff member on move-in days to help residents without income sign up for needed services.

While the number of move-ins will be small compared to San Francisco's overall homeless population, Street to Home could provide some guidance for the housing placement system. The current system, known as coordinated entry, was implemented over the past decade. It soon became clear that there were problems, exacerbated by emergency rules during the pandemic and chronic staff shortages. HSH's top official promised an overhaul in 2021. “We really struggled with the way placements were done before, so I don't want to go back to the old system,” Hall said.

Ask the federal government for permission

If Street to Home, as the HSH itself puts it, “continues to flourish”, the agency should be able to apply an important lesson to its future activities: first accommodate people, then deal with the bureaucratic burden.

But that's easier said than done. One limitation is the federal government, which funds about 16 percent of HSH's assisted living units. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) requires residents to go through a months-long vetting process before moving into these units.

HSH has asked for a waiver to place people in housing first and then within 60 or 90 days to provide documents proving their identity, income and disability. “If we had the waiver from HUD, it could help make more units available for Street to Home and also expedite housing through the traditional housing process,” Cohen said. Until then, only locally funded units are eligible for an expedited process, whether through Street to Home or coordinated entry.

Cohen said she hopes to receive a response from HUD “within the next few months.” HUD did not respond to questions from The fresh.

But even with a waiver, HSH faces hurdles that will increase the move-in rate for Street to Home. Cohen noted that the program is staff-intensive, which limits its capacity, and that it requires the “eager participation” of other housing providers. HSH said it is in talks with other providers, but none have signed on yet. Block expects Street to Home to continue housing people at a similar rate for the foreseeable future: “I think we've settled on six to eight units a month.”

“This shows us all how we can break down barriers,” Cohen added. “It can show how quickly we can get things done, and that needs to be part of the ongoing work.”

More from The Fresh…

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‘We Had been Residing Virtually Within the Gutter’

Daily SF News — Tue, 26 Dec 2023 15:29:05 +0000

As prices rise, units fill, and waiting lists for subsidized housing get longer or freeze entirely, many low-income residents in San Francisco have been forced to leave the increasingly unaffordable city. But for San Francisco public housing residents, there’s hope that private investment might transform the affordable units that do exist from dilapidated and derelict housing into communities they are happy to call home.

The development at 345 Arguello Blvd. was taken over by the non-profit developer Mercy Housing in 2015. Before, it was home to bedbugs, roaches and bad plumbing. Now, private funds have metamorphosed the old building into a shiny new one, with colorful walls and a modern facade.

Viola Ryan, one long-time resident, remembers what it was like living at 345 Arguello before Mercy Housing took over. Her old room was terrible, Ryan recalled in 2016. “We were living almost in the gutter. … We didn’t have heat and sometimes hot water. We couldn’t get nobody to fix anything for us.” Now, with new appliances and more accountable landlords, Viola is more comfortable.

Mark Peterson/Redux Pictures for Politico Magazine

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Airbnb-backed actual property startup Zeus Dwelling winding down operations

Daily SF News — Wed, 15 Nov 2023 23:04:19 +0000

Zeus Living, a San Francisco-based property management startup that raised $150 million from tech investors and was backed by Airbnb, is reportedly “winding down operations.”

The company, which directly manages the homes and apartments it sublets on its site for extended stays of 30 days or more to corporate employees, relocated workers and anyone looking for the flexibility to move around, is “struggling financially” and can no longer guarantee payments, according to an email to landlords obtained by the Information.

Zeus Living was founded in 2015 in San Francisco, with its headquarters in the Dogpatch neighborhood, and offers services in more than 100 U.S. cities through its website and short-term rental platforms like Airbnb. The company was named one of the Bay Area’s top workplaces of 2022 by the Chronicle.

Unlike Airbnb, Zeus Living designs, furnishes, lists, markets and books the properties it manages and acts as a liaison for tenants while driving revenue for homeowners (“You will never receive an urgent call at 2 am about a plumbing issue — we have it covered,” the website promises).

The company prospered during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic as more employees had the flexibility to work from home and live in different locations.

The startup raised around $150 million, including a $55 million Series B round with participation from Airbnb in December 2019 and a $55 million round in October 2021. Zeus Living achieved an estimated money valuation of $269 million last year, per PitchBook, with additional backing from Comcast, Bowery and Initialized Capital.

However, the shifting economy and rising interest rates have changed the picture. Zeus Living cut approximately 46% of its 140-person workforce in October 2022, including full-time and part-time workers at its San Francisco headquarters and remote locations.

“Like many companies in our industry, we are not immune to the effects of market volatility, inflation, war, and the possibility of a recession,” a spokesperson said at the time. “We’re adapting to the current environment by expediting our path to profitability and sustainably expanding our portfolio of managed homes. We have had to make proactive adjustments, including recent staffing changes across the organization.”

An inquiry to the company on Wednesday about its plans was not immediately returned.

Reach Aidin Vaziri: avaziri@sfchronicle.com

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San Francisco Techies Are Dwelling in Small Pods for $700/Month

Daily SF News — Mon, 23 Oct 2023 01:41:23 +0000

The life of a successful tech founder can often feel luxurious—ritzy, even. But before the multimillion-dollar IPO payouts, the mega-yachts and the Silicon Valley mansions comes the startup grind. And the pods. Just ask Christian Lewis, a 26-year-old from the Chicago suburbs who recently came to San Francisco to chase the AI dragon.

Last week, Lewis posted on social media that he was “living in a $700/mo pod at Mint Plaza for the next 30 days.” For the uninitiated, the “pod” refers to a group house structured like a pod hotel, a Japanese invention of casket-size sleeping spaces designed to cater to travelers on a budget.

Lewis posted the pictures for his online friends, he said, but they went viral—extending far outside his immediate network and into the general network of X/Twitter users. Some expressed horror—“you are paying 700/mo to live in a crate like a dog,” one person opined—while others expressed approval (“california gold rush is a durable culture trait unique to san francisco. modern day 49ers. mad respect,” said another).

Lewis said he has already snagged some funding from Silicon Valley investors for his artificial intelligence programming startup, Spellcraft, but he wanted to be closer to where the action is; after all, Mayor London Breed has dubbed San Francisco the AI capital of the world—home to Anthropic, ScaleAI and, of course, ChatGPT maker OpenAI.

Christian Lewis posted to social media that he was “living in a $700/mo pod at Mint Plaza for the next 30 days” as seen in the inset image. There is a shared living space with a lounge and free utilities, among other amenities, in the spartan residential space. | Source: Courtesy Christian Lewis

“The advantage of being here is too great,” he said.

“I decided to come out for a few weeks, and then when I got here,” he added. “I was like, ‘OK, I’m not gonna leave.’ So I am here until I run out of money.”

Already, Lewis said he has met “some of the smartest people I’d ever met in my life.”

The average rent for a one-bedroom San Francisco apartment is $3,040 a month, according to Zillow. Staying in a $700-per-month pod, therefore, is a way to live in San Francisco on the cheap, Lewis said, without being locked into a pricey yearlong lease. It’s also, he contends, better than an Airbnb—Lewis says he booked “a dump” of a short-term rental on the platform and found it uninhabitable. (He also would rather not live in a shared apartment with roommates.)

The Mint Plaza pod space evokes a co-op, or a much, much more cramped version of those micro-apartments that have popped up throughout the Bay Area. Comparisons to the Hong Kong-style “coffin homes” are not entirely inaccurate. But in Lewis’ words, it’s a form of “minimalist living” for young, unattached people coming in and out of San Francisco. And Wi-Fi and utilities are included.

“For $700, you have workspaces and an office and a place to sleep, so that’s pretty great,” he said. “It’s downtown.”

‘It’s Not Really That Rough’

Back to the pods: They’re each 4 feet high, 3½ feet wide, and long enough to fit a twin-size mattress. It’s comfortable enough for Lewis, who is 5 foot 9. (Lewis jokes that I should report that he’s an inch taller so that he can boast about it on the dating apps. I do not oblige.)

Lewis advises that I take my sneakers off before he takes me to observe the sleeping pods.

You don’t want to disturb anyone who could be asleep, he explains, as we inch toward the stacks of pods on Thursday afternoon. Each is sheathed with a black curtain as the main mode of privacy. There are about 20 of them, stacked in twos like bunks.

“It’s not really that rough,” he says. “All they really did is shrink down the sleeping space instead of having 50 different rooms, right?”

The pods occupy the top floor of a three-story building that used to be a bank. The company responsible for the development, Brownstone Shared Housing, received international media attention for a similar project in Palo Alto. (One outlet, for example, called the pods “a pricey prison.”)

“I came here, and it’s really way better than I was led to believe by those articles,” Lewis said.

Building Used to House a Credit Union

About 20 people currently are staying in the pods, Lewis said, a mixture of founders and programmers looking to take advantage of San Francisco’s AI boom, post-graduate students, artists and folks who work in retail and service. One occupant said he holds down two jobs, including one at the nearby Carl’s Jr., and said he likes the place just fine.

Lewis guided me quickly through the common spaces. There were signs that people do live here: Backpacks sat on a couch, and empty cans were left on a coffee table in the main-floor lounge. String lights were hung on what looked like faux-brick walls; it was cozy, all things considered.

Signs of the pod housing’s past life—as an outpost of the San Francisco Fire Credit Union—are still very much present. Bank tellers’ desks have been converted to shared workspaces while a private workroom is shaped just like a manager’s small office. A lounge/storage space on the ground floor, painted white and lit with severe commercial bulbs, has the air of an empty break room; credit union workers probably reheated their lunches in the oven- and stove-less “kitchen” here.

(I was not allowed to take pictures, and some residents, apparently, already had grievances with a reporter visiting their common spaces entirely.)

Lewis plans on sticking around until his funds run out—he estimates he could be in the pod for about a year. Alternatively, if he and Spellcraft, his startup, make it big, he would consider moving out to an “overpriced apartment.” But a week in, he seemed content with his pod.

“I need quite a jump, really, in all honesty, in order to be able to afford the traditional apartment here.”

READ MORE: San Francisco Begins Investigation Into $700 ‘Pod’ Living Spaces

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San Francisco Sues Chinatown Landlords Over Unsafe Dwelling Situations

Daily SF News — Thu, 19 Oct 2023 22:14:24 +0000

San Francisco is suing a group of property owners and affiliated companies that are accused of numerous building violations, including tenants living in unsafe and dirty conditions.

The three properties, all single-room-occupancy residential hotels in and around Chinatown, are located at 1443-1449 Powell St., 790 Vallejo St. and 912 Jackson St.

City Attorney David Chiu said city officials had heard from tenants in the buildings that maintenance requests went completely unaddressed or unanswered, and the city’s Department of Building Inspections had also spent years trying to get landlords to abate the dangerous conditions. But little progress was made.

READ MORE: This Family Owns a Century-Old San Francisco Chinese Restaurant. Now They’re Saying Goodbye

“That’s why at this point, we feel that we need to initiate litigation,” Chiu said. “We will sue them all together to make sure that there is collective liability.”

There are 22 pending violations issued by the city against the landlords, according to the lawsuit document, the building department and Chiu. Specific accusations include construction work without permits, broken doors and windows, rusted plumbing, exposed electrical wiring, rodent and insect infestations, mold, unsanitary shared bathrooms, lack of smoke detectors, seismic safety issues, insufficient emergency exits and paint with lead risks.

A dirty window can be seen in this 2022 photo taken in one of the buildings involved in the lawsuit. | Source: Courtesy Department of Building InspectionsChinatown landlords are being sued for forcing tenants to live in unsafe conditions, with insect infestations among the many violations. | Source: Courtesy Department of Building Inspections

Patrick O’Riordan, the director of the Department of Building Inspection, said this case is especially troublesome because of the extreme conditions described above and the resistance from the landlords to cooperate.

“Our warnings were ignored. Our violations were disregarded. This lawsuit will change that dynamic,” O’Riordan said in a statement to The Standard. “I want every landlord to know that we are here to make sure that every resident lives in a safe, clean, code-compliant home.”

Three individual defendants are named in the file—Jeff Appenrodt, Shailendra Devdhara and Kamlesh Patel—along with a long list of companies believed to be their affiliates. The three defendants are said to have operated, owned or managed the properties on and off during recent years. The city is still figuring out other remaining individuals’ identities related to the ownership of the buildings.

The Standard reached out to the defendants but received a response only from Appenrodt, who said he’s unaware of any pending violations. According to Google Maps street view, Appenrodt’s real estate firm poster can be seen on the 790 Vallejo St. building.

City officials, building tenants and tenant rights activists from Chinatown Community Development Center are expected to hold a press conference in Chinatown on Tuesday morning. The City Attorney’s lawsuit asks the court to issue a permanent injunction ordering the owners to permanently abate all code violations and pay for the expenses. The defendants are also asked to pay penalty fees, which may exceed a million dollars.

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San Francisco sues 3 Chinatown constructing homeowners over unsafe residing circumstances

Daily SF News — Thu, 12 Oct 2023 04:37:42 +0000

[Source]

San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu has filed a lawsuit against the owners of three Chinatown buildings, all single occupancy hotels, over the unsafe living conditions of tenants.

Unsafe living conditions: The tenants have long-standing complaints of deteriorating conditions of the properties, including non-functional appliances, infestations of mice and insects and insufficient hot water.

Moreover, Notices of Violations dating back to 2018 list various infractions, including plumbing issues, exposed electrical wiring, mold, unsanitary shared restrooms, broken doors and locks and damaged ceilings, floors and walls.

“Inhumane”: One of the residents, Yan Fen Liu, told KTVU that since new owners took over one of the buildings in 2014, their living conditions have only gotten worse. She argues that their rent payments should secure them a clean and safe living environment at the least.

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“These are first generation immigrant tenants who were taken advantage of, being forced to live in conditions that are unacceptable and many would say inhumane,” Chiu told KTVU. “The owners of these three particular SROs did not meet their responsibility under the law. They need to be accountable.”

About the lawsuit: The lawsuit was filed against owners Jeff Appendrodt, Shailendra Devdhara, Kamlesh Patel and five associated limited liability companies for the three single room occupancy (SRO) hotels located at 1449 Powell Street, 790 Vallejo Street and 912 Jackson Street in Chinatown.

The lawsuit accuses the property owners of violating state housing law and California’s Unfair Competition Law, alleging that they profited from renting out dwellings with violations, creating an unfair advantage over compliant landlords. The property owners may face fines amounting to millions of dollars.

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Unresolved violations: City officials also noted that there are at least 14 unauthorized SRO rooms and 21 unresolved violations related to health, sanitation, structural damage and unpermitted work. The city is seeking penalties, fees and injunctive relief to rectify the violations at these properties.

“For years, we’ve tried to bring these properties into compliance and made only modest progress. Our warnings were ignored. Our violations were disregarded. That changes today,” Department of Building Inspector Director Patrick O’Riordan said, according to CBS News.

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San Francisco sues 3 Chinatown constructing homeowners over unsafe dwelling situations

Daily SF News — Wed, 11 Oct 2023 18:36:13 +0000

[Source]

San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu has filed a lawsuit against the owners of three Chinatown buildings, all single occupancy hotels, over the unsafe living conditions of tenants.

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Better of the Bay 2023: Metropolis Residing Winners

Daily SF News — Mon, 02 Oct 2023 03:42:50 +0000

48 Hills is proud to host the 49th edition of the Bay Guardian Best of the Bay! Congratulations to all the winners of this years Readers’ Poll, and thank you to the thousands of readers who voted this year. See more winners’ categories here. And join us to celebrate the city and independent media on Thursday, October 26, at our 10th Anniversary 48 Hills Gala!

BEST STREET FAIR
FOLSOM STREET FAIR
www.folsomstreetevents.org
Runners Up: Haight Street Fair, North Beach Festival

BEST TOURIST ATTRACTION
FERRY BUILDING
www.ferrybuildingmarketplace.com
Runners Up: Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz

BEST HOTEL
PHOENIX HOTEL
www.phoenixsf.com
Runners Up: Fairmont San Francisco, Hotel Kabuki

BEST TOUR
TIE
BLANDINA FARLEY’S FABULOUS TOURS
www.blandinatours.com
SKIP THE BUS
www.skipthebus.com
Runners Up: SF Ghost Hunt, SF City Guides

BEST KIDS’ VENUE
EXPLORATORIUM
www.exploratorium.edu
Runners Up: Randall Museum of Science, House of Air

BEST POLITICIAN
DEAN PRESTON
Runners Up: Hillary Ronen, Honey Mahogany

BEST ONLINE PERSONALITY
BROKE-ASS STUART
www.brokeassstuart.com
Runners Up: Princess Panocha, Peter Finch

BEST LOCAL WEBSITE
MISSION LOCAL
www.missionlocal.org
Runners Up: Broke-Ass Stuart, Funcheap SF

BEST PODCAST
TIE
BITCHTALK
www.bitchtalkpodcast.com
THE BLACK LANDSCAPE
www.soundcloud.com/theblacklandscape
Runners Up: Bay Curious, Sad Francisco

BEST RADIO STATION
BFF.FM
www.bff.fm
Runners Up: KPOO, KALW

BEST NONPROFIT
CREATIVITY EXPLORED
www.creativityexplored.org
Runners Up: Rocket Dog Rescue, Mental Health Association Of San Francisco

BEST ANIMAL RESCUE
ROCKET DOG RESCUE
www.rocketdogrescue.org
Runners Up: Muttville, SFSPCA

BEST DOG WALKERS
DOG TALES
www.dogtalesunleashed.com
Runners Up: Sniff & Go, Earth Girl Dog Walker

BEST DOG GROOMERS
VIRGINIA’S PROFESSIONAL PET GROOMING
1800 San Jose Avenue, SF.
(415) 860-0720
Runners Up: VIP Grooming, Kosita’s Pet Grooming

BEST PLUMBING
HEISE’S PLUMBING
www.heisesplumbing.com
Runners Up: Ace Plumbing, Sugar Bear Plumbing

BEST ELECTRICIAN
PAURIC ELECTRIC
www.thesfelectrician.com
Runners Up: Ike’s Electric, Value Electric

BEST MOVING SERVICE
DELANCEY STREET MOVERS
www.delanceystreetfoundation.org
Runners Up: Gentle Giant, Sierra Sherpas

BEST HOUSE CLEANERS
LA COLECTIVA
www.lacolectivasf.com
Runners Up: John’s Cleaning Co., Vital Housecleaning

BEST AUTO MECHANICS
PAT’S GARAGE
www.patsgarage.com
Runners Up: Action Auto Care, Noe Valley Auto Repair

BEST BICYCLE REPAIR
BOX DOG BIKES
www.boxdogbikes.com
Runners Up: Scenic Routes, Valencia Cyclery

BEST TAILOR
AL’S ATTIRE
www.alsattire.com
Runners Up: Michelle’s Tailor, Vladimir Vladimirov Executive Tailoring

BEST SALON
GINGER RUBIO SALON
www.gingerrubio.com
Runners Up: ORO Salon, Glamarama

BEST GYM
FITNESS SF
www.fitnesssf.com
Runners Up: Fog City Community Fitness, Rhythm & Motion

BEST TRAINER
ACE MORGAN
www.acemorganfitness.com
Runners Up: Dudley Flores, Ken Scott

BEST YOGA STUDIO
NEW MISSION YOGA
www.newmissionyoga.com
Runners Up: HAUM Studio, Yoga Flow

The post Better of the Bay 2023: Metropolis Residing Winners appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

‘Founders’ Are Transferring to SF and Residing In Sleeping Pods Once more

Daily SF News — Sun, 24 Sep 2023 10:05:34 +0000

Something must be shifting with the local economy, and as San Francisco continues to be a hotbed of artificial intelligence innovation, the people moving here for a piece of that gold rush are finding what many of us found coming here in years past: really high rents.

While much media attention has been paid to everyone leaving San Francisco, the reality is that rents still haven’t gotten much cheaper in the last few years — a little, maybe, for new units, but not a lot. And highlighting the fact that tech newcomers are arriving every day to make their AI dreams come true and they’re having sticker shock about rents here, we have a new story from ABC 7 about a new iteration of the sleeping-pod dorms we used to see around the time of the last tech boom.

Now, SFist’s Apartment Sadness column — which came about back during the last tech boom because of the wealth of hilariously awful and hilariously expensive apartments that were popping up for rent on Craigslist — featured its share of pod-type and bunkbed arrangements eight and nine ago. Somebody was even renting out a box truck as a living space, and somebody with a house near Google’s headquarters in Mountain View was renting a tent in their backyard for $965.

Back around 2015 there were literally dozens of listings for communal living situations where someone was making a buck off these newcomers by renting them bunks and packing 13 or 20 people into a three-bedroom apartment. And there were lots of news stories about twentysomethings coming to town and living this neo-commune life, with laptops.

If one thing never changes, it’s the frugality of newly arrived engineers and so-called founders, who are just all about the work and can’t be bothered to, like, have sex or pay for a place where they could bring someone to have said sex. There’s just too much work to do! And why pay $2,000 or $3,000 for an apartment when all you’re going to be doing there is sleeping a few hours?

So, we have a new story — a story that pretends, anyway, that this phenomenon is not just a replay of eight years ago — about a pod-rental outfit that appears to be in the Mission District, renting little sleeping pods for $700 a month.

“The pod is the size of a twin bed. So it’s not very large but it gets the job done. You just need a place to sleep,” says SpellCraft AI founder Christian Lewis, speaking to ABC 7.

Lewis has a pretty familiar story too. He came here from Illinois, he put off coming here because it’s so expensive, but now that he’s here he wants to stay and he’s “met some of the smartest people I’ve met in my entire life.”

Lewis says there are at least 20 people living in this pod palace who are working in the AI space — they don’t give the address, but it appears to be this one in Mint Plaza, which was first proposed in 2021 and which still appears to be seeking permits for a full renovation inside. SF YIMBY reported in July that the firm behind the pod hotel at 12 Mint Plaza, Elsey Partners, wants ultimately to have a full-service, eight-story, Japanese-style pod hotel here with 137 pods and a basement spa.

Rendering of the 12 Mint Plaza pod hotel, at center, courtesy of Elsey Partners

And just as some economists have discussed over the years, the human capital and synergies of places like San Francisco and Boston, surrounded by world-class higher-education institutions as well as great amenities, will likely always have high rents because the supply-and-demand equation is different than in many places.

“Like smart engineers, investors, incubators all that sort of stuff,” Lewis tells ABC 7 of who he’s met here. “There are tons of resources, tons of human capital here. That is why I’m here and why I’m staying here.”

Someone should tell these people that you can, if you’re planning to stay, just go on Craigslist and for a few hundred dollars more find a normal-sized room that can fit an adult-sized bed in any number of neighborhoods around town.

Related: Proposed Mint Plaza ‘Pod Hotel’ Hits a Snag, as Rival Pod Hotel Group Claims Trademark Infringement

All previous editions of Apartment Sadness

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