The Four Seasons Hotel San Francisco at Embarcadero owner has defaulted on its property loans. The hotel was acquired for $126.6 million in 2019 or ~ $816,000 per key. They owe $72.5 million, are over $3 million behind in making payments, and have defaulted.
The hotel occupies the top 11 floors of the 48-story tower at 345 California Street (though its address is 222 Sansome Street). It was opened in 1986 as the Mandarin Oriental.
Credit: Four Seasons San Francisco Embarcadero
It’s not the first hotel in the city to go bust. For instance, the Hilton SF Union Square and Parc 55 surrendered to their lender last June, with the Hilton Financial District also defaulted on a $97 million loan.
Some observers argue that the Four Season’s problems are its location – but it’s precisely what’s happened to the location that creates the problems. San Francisco’s problems of crime, drugs on the street, and homelessness are hardly limited to the location around the Four Seasons. Here’s about a mile and a half away:
@freqmeek San Francisco Tenderloin Area Effects of The Fentanyl Crisis and The People Affected By This Epidemic. Where is our protection ? There are so many concerns and protections in place for drug users and homeless people but what about the working class that have to pray that they make it to and from work in this environment. These are real dangers faced every single day just to be able to provide for your family . They got money for war but can’t feed the poor. These elected officials both republican and democrats continue to fail the people. No humanity.. We have a crisis right here in our backyard and we’re funding wars in other countries .. #fyp #communityleader #dreamkeeper #sf #mayorlondonbreed #govgavinnewsom #fentanylkills #fentanylcrisis #opiobsessed #anxiety #relief #mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #homeless #community #change #addiction #protect #humanity #safety #cityofsf #49ers #gsw #gswarriors #tragedy #crisis #epidemic #warondrugsfailure #electedofficials #sfblogger #culture #lifeinsf #mentalhealthmatters #accesstohealthcare #shaderoom #hollywood #joebiden #kamalaharris #sfpd #help #humanity #failedgovernment #politics ♬ original sound – FreqMeek
The pandemic made it vulnerable to these problems – people left (whether for LA or other states), and the reason to stay in San Francisco was because of the other people who there there. Work from home and work from anywhere increasingly meant being in San Francisco was no longer the exclusive path to success in tech and adjacent industries.
To be fair, San Francisco’s policies aren’t exclusively of its own making. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that cities can’t clear homeless encampments without providing adequate shelter, and the standard for what that is remains unclear. However other cities within the jurisdiction of the 9th Circuit are covered by the same ruling and not nearly as troubled and they managed a clean up in advance of President Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping meeting there in November.
This is sad for me. Growing up, my dad lived here. I spent a lot of time in San Francisco. It’s not the same city it was 40 or even 20 years ago.
Keep on voting DemocRat for more of the same….
San Francisco can just rot away. The voters have caused this problem as they continue to elect their representatives in the state, county and city governments. I do not feel sorry for them one bit. Get your woke heads out of your a**, er…the sand and vote them out.
What leftist “policies” are turning normal, contributing members of society into drug-addicted, mentally-ill zombies?
So sad to see, placing San Francisco on the same personal “No-Go Zone” list as Haiti, Somalia, Iraq, Gaza etc. was not on my bingo card 5 years ago.
I remember Embarcadero 40+ years ago and it was amazing! San Francisco was literally a gleaming city on a hill – I envied the people who lived there. The last time I was there a few years ago I found it so repeatedly ugly, smelly, and scary that I decided to switch a service provider that I was using that had offices there so that I wouldn’t ever need to return . . . and I haven’t, and at this point probably won’t.
By the way, if you look at the record of the 9th Circuit case you will see a City that didn’t really want to win, with lopsided pro bono representation of the homeless by some of the most resourceful law firms in the country – belief that homeless have the moral right to live and defecate in the street in the middle of downtown is the ultimate luxury belief – and a City counsel office that couldn’t – or wouldn’t – shoot straight and waived many arguments (whether through negligence or on purpose). Moreover, the statute at issue could easily be fixed and reimposed, but there is apparently no will to move forward in the city or state legislatures – either of which have the power to fix this or at least bring it to the same level as the rest of the country. Instead, San Francisco is another Detroit . . . a ruined but once great city.
The totally predictable result of Democrat policies. Keep an eye on other Dem ‘rotten boroughs’ for similar things. Remeber, this is a pro-crime party.
It’s not yet as bad as it could be, it may actually end up more like Johannesburg downtown in a few years, with decaying sky scrapers inhabited by gangs and refugees. The whole area a no-go zone where you wouldn’t want to risk your life.
@Nick: Good point. We have not seen the full spectrum of this trend in the US yet. South Africa-Joberg is further along.
@L3 … Haiti is more further along .
Go ahead and let SF, Portland and Seattle drop to 3rd world status with your liberal policies. Businesses will leave, residents will move away and tourists won’t go. It will be a vicious cycle downward. That’s what you get when the woke community thinks defunding police, doing away with cash bail, decriminalizing many “minor” crimes (including most property crimes) and tolerating this type of behavior are good things.
Personally, I’m all for debtors’ prisons and moving the homeless to a big encampment away from the city. Put up razor wire, set up showers/toilets and let them pitch their tents there. The other option is a “purge” to rid us of these parasites. Responsible citizens should NEVER be expected to put up with this.
Yes it is sad vs 20 or 40 years ago
It wasn’t disneyland then either – tenderloin had less overt homeless but your car would be robbed of parts in short order – lots of ‘bad’ neighborhoods you simply avoided including most of soma – homeless were a ‘problem’ since the early 80s at least
at least a year and a half ago when i last visited the ferry building / embarcadero front was getting close to clean as the old days but just not well trafficked
not sure how bad or better it is now – to me the sensory assault of street living is the big issue
I am wondering who has actually visited SF recently. I go there couple times a year. Sure it’s got chronically bad parts like the Tenderloin district shown on the video, like any other city. But most of the city is pleasant and safe to walk around. I do agree that it isn’t nearly as vibrant and wonderful as it used to be pre-Covid, pre-London Breed.
San Francisco had always been dirty and gross and dangerous since the 90s. It’s just now people are tired of it?
@Nick Jo’berg is an apt analogy. Detroit was destroyed over generations, but like Jo’burg, San Francisco’s destruction will have taken less than a decade from great gleaming city into a dangerous ruin. Seattle will come close to this – and is also absolutely shocking to see how easy it is for a few leftist populists to destroy a city – but never reached the level of world city like SFO or JNB.
That is not the Four Seasons Embarcadero. That’s the Four Seasons San Francisco, which is on Market between Third and Fourth. The Four Seasons Embarcadero (previously Lowes, before that Mandarin Oriental) is over on Sansome in the Financial District. Ironically the Market Street location is far more impacted by the city’s much-publicized homelessness and drug problems. The “Embarcadero” Four Seasons’ troubles are in all likelihood more related to remote work than the problems you see on Fox News.
I’ve been living in SF TL for the past 14 years can tell you that nothing has changed this whole time. The TL (Tenderloin) is a small part of the city where “officials” prefers to contain riff raff within and not spread out to other “proper” parts of the city. This has stood since growing up in the Bay the past 45 years. It by far doesnt mean that all of San Francisco and the Bay Area should be represented by this small part of town. Most major cities have similar bad parts of town. You simply stay away from those parts and enjoy the rest of what the city offers. I would suggest that you don’t rent a car and park in city streets. Car break ins and theft is a whole seperate issue that has upticked but still don’t mean you can’t visit and have fun.
Forty years ago, I was stationed at an Air Force base near Sacramento. San Francisco was always a welcome weekend getaway. Now, you could not pay me to visit. Hellscape is correct and it breaks my heart to remember what a fantastic city it once was. This is progressive politics at its culmination.
With Democrats in charge at every level, this should surprise precisely no one.
Don’t let them do to the country what they’ve done to California.
@Douglas Beach: Don’t believe gthe “remote work” story that apologists try to fob off on you. If it were true Texas and Florida cities would have the same problems. They don’t. The remote work effect is mild and non-principal, San Francisco’s problems are the result of the things that others have discussed above but can be bundled together as Democrat policies. They are pro-crime..
As a life long resident of San Francisco and a 5th generation Californian reading the responses are hilarious. Does SF have issues? Yep! Is the ENTIRE city filled with crime, drugs and homeless? Nope. This is a beautiful city and the most expensive one to live in as well. Ever wonder why that is? Must be cause it’s “woke” – whatever that means…
I travel quite a bit which I’d like to assume is why you commenters follow this blog. I have yet to set foot in a city anywhere in the world that does not have problems with crime, drugs and homeless. It’s everywhere…
Cultural shifts have sociological impact.
in 1981, when President Ronald Reagan deinstitutionalized the mentally ill and emptied the psychiatric hospitals into so-called “community” clinics, the problem got worse.
There is no place to put the raving insane. Judges do not want to put them into prison, as those facilities are not capable of managing that type of population.
Then add to that the more recent impact of the collapse of business travel, and the collapse of commercial office space in the USA.
When I worked for Cisco, it was easy for folks to come to SFO to have an executive briefing. Now, it’s webex or zoom, unless live is critical. It is just the way things change.
As to completely idiotic comments like “Keep on voting DemocRat for more of the same….”, we all know that @David R. Miller, keyboard warrior, brings his own agenda to every conversation he can.
The reality is: In 2020, the United States experienced one of its most dangerous years in decades.
The number of murders across the country surged by nearly 30% between 2019 and 2020, according to FBI statistics. The overall violent crime rate, which includes murder, assault, robbery and rape, inched up around 5% in the same period.
But in 2023, crime in America looked very different.
“At some point in 2022 — at the end of 2022 or through 2023 — there was just a tipping point where violence started to fall and it just continued to fall,” said Jeff Asher, a crime analyst and co-founder of AH Datalytics.
As to San Francisco, here is the reality: Rachel Swan, a breaking news and enterprise reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, says there are “two really visible crises” in the downtown area: homelessness and open-air drug use.
“And honestly, people conflate that with crime, with street safety,” she said. “One thing I’m starting to learn in reporting on public safety is that you can put numbers in front of people all day, and numbers just don’t speak to people the way narrative does.”
Let me ask you this:
Do you think Republican policies will address..
Homelessness?
Mental health crisis?
Drug use?
Income disparity?
Hmmmm…
I’m no defender of San Francisco but the ” 1.5 miles away” reference is ridiculous – nearly any US city is going to have issues this far from downtown, and have areas a tourist wouldn’t visit. No excuses for San Francisco but not sure it should be singled out.
Also, the suggestion that the area around the FS Embarcadero has problems with “crime, drugs on the street, and homelessness”. Sure, the area is quieter than it used to be but it’s not infested with these issues as you’re suggesting.
@Zebraitis: “Do you think Republican policies will address”.
They already have. It’s called Texas, or Florida, or any small town.
Hey Gary, the Tenderloin has always been bad and has always been a half mile from the Four Seasons. Somehow the Four Seasons was always able to make it work before, when business travel was still a thing and companies were still forcing people into the office. The Four Seasons is right in the middle of the Financial District and the immediate area is fine, it’s just that nothing happens they anymore because businesses aren’t in person anymore.
It’s also very funny to see everyone try to blame everything in SF on votes for liberal politicians, given that in the 22 years I’ve lived in SF, progressive candidates have only won one city-wide election over the moderate faction – and when that happened there was immediately a successful recall campaign funded by venture capitalists.
“Moderate” in SF = “Radical Left” everywhere else.
San Francisco is a failed city by any measure. Democrats are in charge at every level and have been for years.
Any commentary beyond that is simply desperate, delusional spin.
Wow. Gary has become a culture warrior, and not just a purveyor of every salacious story related to travel.
San Francisco, downtown and everywhere, is NOT a ‘hellscape’. Like other big cities, it had a big decline in commercial occupancies with the pandemic, but also had a huge boom right before. Yes, there are areas of the downtown that are horrible, just like in all big US cities, but this is just an overblown media narrative that is driven by the culture warriors.
When were you last there and how many times in the last year? I have been there a number of times, including just two weeks ago, so know from experience.
It was too crowded and expensive anyway, so just stay in your ‘wonderful’ city and wait for the searing summer months.
Yeah, it’s worse since the pandemic. If it was a 8 out of 10 city in 2019, maybe it’s a 6 out of 10 city now. And yeah, it’s disappointing to have the highest taxes I’ve ever had and not see the cities problems come under control.
But I still walk a mile to work on tree-lined streets everyday, visit beautiful parks and beaches filled with families on the weekend, and *gasp* bike through the hellscape tenderloin to visit artisanal cheese shops.
It’s easily the highest quality of life of any American city I’ve ever lived in. Not even close.
The Tenderloin has always been bad (look up the etymology), is inarguably worse now, but is just a tiny corner of downtown. How many cities would look good if all the picture the world saw was from their worst 4 square blocks?
Hellscape? Believe me I understand the frustration, but hyperbole shouldn’t trump truthfulness…
@Jake1- i there for a week every year and it’s wonderful by the Embarcadero and even Union Square is nice (summer 23). Show me the video of the tenderloin and conflating it with the Embarcadero gets an F in travel geography
Gary should know better if he has familiar with the city . Gary , when was the last time you were there?
Yes, the tenderloin is awful but the embark arrow area is wonderful and Gary did get the hotel locations confused.
@Jake1: “even Union Square is nice”
How many stores have moved out?
Do you think an earthquake or a tsunami would help increase the real estate values in San Francisco?
@Win Whitmire (and others of similar bent) —> Obviously you live in the City and are intimately familiar with the problems of San Francisco; thank you for your insightful comments. Have you gotten to the point yet where you’re blaming the 1906 earthquake on politics as well? Just askin’ (for a friend).
Does crime exist? Of course it does. It does everywhere. But crime in SF is DOWN more than 30% YTD. Miami, FWIW, is also down by a whopping 8.85%.
When it comes to Dallas, “the start of 2024 has been different. The city’s murder rate is down about 17% and some categories of violent crime saw even larger reductions”…Although the overall crime rate is down — Dallas officials say there is one outlier. Business robberies increased more than 60% over last year. https://www.keranews.org/news/2024-02-13/dallas-overall-violent-crime-rate-drops-nearly-30-but-business-robberies-increase-over-last-year
Let’s stick to miles and points. This comment thread is a sewer.
Please, Gary. Like you have some street cred saying “my dad lived there.”
For those of us that *do* live here, Hayes Valley is nice. Marina is nice. Crissy Field all the way to the GG bridge, the Embarcadero, and all the neighborhoods with 8s and 9s for schools are nice. One small section of downtown is blighted (the tenderloin was never a place to go) and FiDi is dead. For years, residents railed on big money changing the culture of the city by gentrifying and making it impossible to afford. Now they left a big hole in the city… is anyone surprised? Peak utilitarianism by profit-seeking entities.
That said, does London Breed and our city supervisors suck? Absolutely! But to call the city a hellscape means you just get your news from X and right-wing podcasts, and you don’t actually know anything about the 7×7.
@Zebraitis, LBJ deinstitutionalized mental health in the 60s (and was quite proud of this CF) and created extended community mental health services so please check your facts. This money saving, “health” improvement has been seized upon by politicians and administrators from both parties and ignores some of the most vulnerable populations in our community. Unfortunately, once hospitals closed and beds are eliminated, they are never recouped.
Commenters be honest. Are you getting your info from Fox and TikTok or from actually being in SF?
@L3 – you got me confused with someone else lol. Any case, I only said most of the city is still a pleasant place to visit and was wondering if folks trashing SF have actually visited recently.
The thought of Gary chilling in the Tenderloin is laughable. That place has been challenged for decades and unless he was looking to buy drugs, I call BS. He didn’t go there as a kid.
People have been calling for SF’s (and California’s) demise for decades too. The hippies, the AIDS crisis, the drugs, gay marriage, the homeless, it was all supposed to be the last nail.
Anyway, no surprise that View From The Right Wing beats this drum while ignoring the dozens of hotels all over that failed too. Dallas, Atlanta, Vegas, etc. The most troubled hotel market last year was Houston in the Great Red State of Texas.
We can politicize it all we want, but there’s a huge issue with mental health and homelessness that’s all related. Florida is the #3 state for homelessness. Texas is #5. It’s everywhere. Red, blue, etc. Most of our issues boil down to rights which are granted by the Constitution. You can’t force people to get or accept help. NYC and Anchorage have a higher homeless per capita population than SF, but they can compel people to accept assistance because the alternative is freezing to death. CA and Southern states don’t have that tool in their toolbox. Austin and Raleigh even have a higher percent of unsheltered homeless than SF. But the temperate climates have generally higher rates of unsheltered than cold climates. New York has 94% of their homeless in shelters and Boston has 97% sheltered, compared to warmer weather SF (43%), Austin (29%), Tucson (26%), and Raleigh (24%).
Until we remove the freedoms that allow people to remain on the streets, this will continue to be an issue.
Once upon a time I worked across the street from this hotel. The area was wonderful. Before that I lived for a while at the Clift. While behind the Clift was never really ok in front of it to the financial district was fine. Now I will NOT go to SF nor will I ever encourage anyone to go there. You would be safer and more comfy in the worst slums of Brazil. Yes the leadership of SF did this. They chose to see how much worse than Oakland they could make the city. Time to close the place down. Give it ten years then start over.
I find it amazing that there are those posting here who deny what has and is happening in San Francisco – and too all of California. DemocRats have RUINED this city and state – and it will only get worse as long as these corrupt DemocRats continue to be elected.
SF has a lower crime rate than most southern and Midwest cities. Memphis is a no go zone but no one ever talks about it.
The Four Seasons is not in the Tenderloin! 1.5 miles in S.F. is like 5 miles anywhere else. Yes the city’s leaders suck but the big problem is the popping of the tech bubble and dispersion of the industry to second-tier cities thanks to remote and distributed work.
Screw you for your lazy narrative following. There’s *tons* to do in the City still, even if there aren’t enough wankers willing to pay Four Season’s chichi rates
@Uncle Jeff: You have just spiun a pack of lies.
” ignoring the dozens of hotels all over that failed too. Dallas, Atlanta, Vegas, etc.”
They ignored your invention.
The most troubled hotel market last year was Houston in the Great Red State of Texas.
Wrong.
“It’s [Homelessness] everywhere”
Wriong. Vast differences between Dallas (virtualy zero) vs. SFO (everywhere);
Austin — Democrat.
Crime? San Francisco.
Stores closing in the heart of the tourist area? San Francisco.
Toothpaste under lock and key? San Francisco.
You have believed everything CNN has told you. Pro-crime Democrats have ruined San Francisco.
We are talking about the visibility of the problem and the enforcement. First try to categorize the causes of the problems attempt to address them and mqybr then you reduce the visibility of what you see. if the underlying causes continue to exist why do you think the problems they are visible will end?
@Esquiar: Talk about Memphis all the time. Just not on your favorite CNN. Same problem as SFO — Denmocrat-run => High crime.
Now that 4 Seasons is bust, there is more room for the illegals and homeless. It must bring smiles to the governor.
SFO is one of the best airports in America! You can’t bash a cities airport in relation to its cities issues.
@L3, you know CNN is owned by a Trumper, right?
The best part of this story for me is that the Dem’s in Minnesota (and especially the ‘Clown Council’ in Minneapolis), consistently refer to San Francisco and essentially ALL of California as the Gold Standards for what they ‘want to ascribe to’. Based on this article it looks like they are absolutely on track to fulfill that esteemed vision and goal!
Or as I often say….be careful who you vote for as they might actually get elected!
@L3 – Austin is the capital of the bright red state of Texas. The governor is letting this happen under his watch right in his backyard.
You’re repeating the Fox News narrative and denying what’s happening throughout the country. Here’s a Dallas Walmart locking up socks and underwear: https://www.dallasnews.com/business/retail/2023/11/07/shoplifting-up-73-in-dallas-as-retailers-rush-to-put-merchandise-out-of-reach/
This stuff is happening in soft on crime Texas with a felony theft threshold more than double California’s. Texas allows $2,500 in theft before it’s a felony, more than double California’s strict $950.
17th of June 2017 12:30pm I vividly remember watching a homeless junkie taking a shit in the middle of a downtown sidewalk as people just casually walked around him. Further illustrating that Liberalism is a mental disorder