425 Bush St

425 Bush St is a 6-story building in Downtown San Francisco with 100% of its floor area within daylight reach of a facade. This screen estimates 37 homes and scores it 89 out of 100 for office-to-residential conversion suitability.

CA-11 · Screened 2026-10-12 · Strong candidate

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Where 425 Bush St is

Its block in Downtown San Francisco, drawn from San Francisco's own building outlines and street centerlines.

41 Montgomery St: scores 100 out of 100101 Montgomery St: scores 100 out of 100350 Bush St: scores 100 out of 100222 Kearny St: scores 90 out of 100246 Sutter St: scores 90 out of 100312 Sutter St: scores 89 out of 1001 Claude Ln: scores 76 out of 1009090897689CLAUDE LNSUTTER STBUSH STGRANT AVEMARK LNKEARNY STHARLAN PLHARDIE PLSAINT GEORGE ALYBELDEN STN100 ftDowntown San Francisco
Suitability score
0–29
30–49
50–69
70–100
  • Already housing
  • Not screened
  • 425 Bush St
425 Bush St and the 1,000 ft of Downtown San Francisco around it. The streets are drawn at the width of the right-of-way they run down, sidewalks included, and named, and every building on these blocks is drawn. What is left open and stippled is neither: a surface lot, a plaza or a vacant parcel. The screened buildings are colored by the ramp above, the same one the district map uses, carry their score, and each is a link to its own page. Each casts a shadow as long as its measured height lets it, so towers stand out from the low buildings around them; the unscreened buildings have no measured height and cast none. 425 Bush St is outlined in its own score color at the outline it covers at ground level. The inset places it among every building the screen covers.
26 ftAA50 ftDaylit 100%
Floor plan: 100% of each floor sits within daylight reach of a facade, with no dead core at all. The shading is daylight, darkest at the windows and gone 35 ft in. The dimension marks the deepest interior point, 26 ft from the nearest window. A–A is where the section beside it is cut.
Ground floor · no homesDaylit6 floors50 ft
Section A–A: cut across the depth of the plate, through the middle of the core. Daylight reaches 35 ft in from every facade, and here it meets in the middle: the plate is thin enough that no floor is left windowless. The shaded ground floor is converted like the rest and counted as no homes.

This building does not pencil on its own, but a modeled RESIDE Act grant would close the gap if the building qualified for one.

This footprint has no windowless core at all: every point on the floor plate is within 35 ft of a facade, which is unusual and is the main reason it scores as well as it does.

Modeled conversion metrics for 425 Bush St, 2026-10-12.

Suitability scoreStrong candidate89 / 100
Storiesfrom 71 ft LiDAR (2010) height ÷ 12 ft floor-to-floor6
Floor plateper floor, from the city footprint6,967 sq ft
Daylight efficiencyshare within 35 ft of a facade100%
Deepest interior pointviability threshold is 80 ft26 ft
Windowless coreper floor — renovated but never rentable0 sq ft
Estimated homesat 750 sq ft average37
Conversion cost$405/sq ft all-in on 34,833 sq ft$14.1M
Gap before grantshortfall against completed value$565K
Modeled RESIDE grantbelow the statutory cap$2.2M
BuiltSan Francisco's own record of the construction year1908
ZoningFinancial District/South BeachC-3-O
Opportunity Zonenot in a 2018 designated tractNo

The plan: window line, shape and floor rhythm

56 ft of exterior wall for each home the screen estimates — enough for two- and three-bedroom homes across the plan.

The typical floor has 414 ft of exterior wall, and across 5 residential floors the building carries 2,069 ft of it in total, divided among the 37 homes this screen estimates.

Its plate is moderately compact at 0.51: a squarish plan, with enough perimeter for a conventional double-loaded corridor. How window line and plate shape are measured.

At the model’s 750 sq ft average, the plan works out at about 7.4 homes per floor, repeated on every residential floor, since this building's outline does not change as it rises.

Why 425 Bush St scores 89 out of 100

Daylight efficiency 100, Interior depth 100, Scale 25, Finance 100 — each out of 100, then weighted.

Score components for 425 Bush St. Points are the subscore times its weight.

ComponentSubscoreWeightPoints
Daylight efficiency100% of the floor area within 35 ft of a facade, scored from 40% up to 90%10045%45.0
Interior depthdeepest interior point 26 ft from a facade, scored from 80 ft down to 40 ft10025%25.0
Scale37 estimated homes, scored from 0 up to 1502515%3.7
Financecompleted value covers conversion cost with 12% to spare, which tops out the component10015%15.0

Most of what it earns comes from daylight efficiency, and what holds it back most is scale, at 25 out of 100: 37 estimated homes, scored from 0 up to 150.

Built in 1908

San Francisco records this building as going up in 1908, which puts it in the pre-1920 stock.

As a rule, the era that converts most readily: load-bearing masonry, small floor plates laid out before deep-plan offices were possible, operable windows and generous floor-to-floor heights. The usual obstacles are not daylight but hazardous materials, lifts and bringing structure up to current code. That is the era’s general tendency rather than a finding about this building — the model reads an outline and a height, and can see nothing inside — but it is the first thing an architect would want to know, and it colours how much confidence the 100% daylight figure above deserves.

What the conversion would cost

$405 per square foot all-in across 34,833 sq ft of converted floor, or $14.1M in total — about $381K for each of the 37 homes.

All-in cost per square foot for 425 Bush St: base cost plus the code work a change of use triggers.

Base conversion cost$260/sq ft
Seismic retrofit (change of use)$45/sq ft
Plumbing risers to every unit$40/sq ft
Operable windows and glazing$30/sq ft
Additional egress stair$18/sq ft
Fire sprinklers (NFPA 13R)$12/sq ft
All-in$405/sq ft

That cost is charged across every converted square foot, including the circulation and service area that earns nothing directly. Against it the model sets a completed value of $366K a home, which for 37 homes is $13.5M.

What would have to be true

A $565K gap before any grant, which the modeled $2.2M closes. What would reopen it soonest: circulation efficiency 8% down.

The shortfall before any grant is $565K. Closing it from the value side means each of the 37 homes finishing at $381K rather than the $366K the model assumes — 4% more. Closing it from the cost side means getting all-in cost down from $405 to $389 per square foot.

A modeled RESIDE grant of $2.2M moves that threshold to $321K a home. That is below the assumed value, which is why this building counts as unlocked by the grant — subject to it qualifying under the law's vacant-and-abandoned test, which this data cannot show.

Each of these, moved on its own, would be enough to undo that for 425 Bush St:

Single-assumption flip points for 425 Bush St, each holding the other three at their defaults.

Circulation efficiencythe binding constraint — the least this building would need8% downto 73%
Average unit size9% upto 820 sq ft
Completed value per home12% downto $321K
Conversion cost per square foot18% upto $308/sq ft

All four are sliders in the survey, where 425 Bush St re-scores against your own numbers.

How it compares in Downtown San Francisco

425 Bush St ranks 89th of the 205 buildings screened here, against a median score of 87.

Its floor plate is better lit than 100% of them, and shallower than 93% of them at its deepest interior point. On size it is the 193rd largest by estimated homes. The full survey of all 205 buildings ranks and maps every one of them, and the list by address links each to its own page.

Within Financial District/South Beach and the C-3-O zone

74th of 165 in Financial District/South Beach, 49th of 88 zoned C-3-O — the comparison that shares its rules, rents and streets.

San Francisco places 165 of the screened buildings in Financial District/South Beach. 425 Bush St ranks 74th of them against a median score of 88. 121 score 70 or more, their median deepest interior point is 47 ft from a facade against this building’s 26 ft, and together they would hold an estimated 40,456 homes. The group’s top scorer is 870 Market St, at 100.

88 of the screened buildings are zoned C-3-O. 425 Bush St ranks 49th of them against a median score of 89. 76 score 70 or more, their median deepest interior point is 44 ft from a facade against this building’s 26 ft, and together they would hold an estimated 21,444 homes. The group’s top scorer is 266 Bush St, at 100.

Its nearest match in size: 312 Sutter St

The screened building closest to 425 Bush St in converted floor area is 312 Sutter St: 34,151 sq ft over 6 stories, against 34,833 sq ft over 6 here.

The two land within a few points of each other — 89 here, 89 there — so at this size the screen reads them as much the same prospect. On the money they sit in the same place: each pencils only with the modeled RESIDE grant. The two stand about 500 ft apart.

Would it qualify for a RESIDE Act grant?

The model awards 425 Bush St $2.2M, on the assumption it qualifies. Whether it does, no published dataset can say.

That figure assumes the building meets the Act’s vacant-and-abandoned test, which turns on code-enforcement and receivership records no city publishes.

It does not sit in a 2018 designated Opportunity Zone, so it would not draw that Section 201 priority.

Other buildings screened near 425 Bush St

The 4 closest the screen also covers, from 150 ft away. They are the colored outlines on the plan at the top of this page.

  • 1 Claude Ln
    9 stories · 82% daylit · 111 estimated homes · scores 76/100 (Strong candidate)
    about 150 ft away
  • 246 Sutter St
    6 stories · 100% daylit · 47 estimated homes · scores 90/100 (Strong candidate)
    about 190 ft away
  • 222 Kearny St
    6 stories · 100% daylit · 50 estimated homes · scores 90/100 (Strong candidate)
    about 290 ft away
  • 350 Bush St
    19 stories · 100% daylit · 161 estimated homes · scores 100/100 (Strong candidate)
    about 400 ft away

A screen, not a feasibility study, from outlines and heights rather than plans: the method and how to correct a figure. If you know this building’s interior, you know what this model cannot see.