950 Minna St

Where 950 Minna St is

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

The plan: window line, shape and floor rhythm

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

The typical floor has 526 ft of exterior wall, and across 5 residential floors the building carries 2,630 ft of it in total, divided among the 72 homes this screen estimates.

Its plate is compact at 0.75: close to a square or a circle, the most efficient envelope an office can have and the least generous one for apartments: little perimeter to divide among homes. How window line and plate shape are measured.

At the model’s 750 sq ft average, the plan works out at about 14.4 homes per floor, repeated on every residential floor, since this building's outline does not change as it rises.

Why 950 Minna St scores 76 out of 100

Daylight efficiency 84, Interior depth 72, Scale 48, Finance 87 — each out of 100, then weighted.

Most of what it earns comes from daylight efficiency, and what holds it back most is scale, at 48 out of 100: 72 estimated homes, scored from 0 up to 150.

Built in 1913

San Francisco records this building as going up in 1913, 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 82% daylight figure above deserves.

What the conversion would cost

$405 per square foot all-in across 82,250 sq ft of converted floor, or $33.3M in total — about $463K for each of the 72 homes.

That cost is charged across every converted square foot, including the 14,731 sq ft of windowless core, which has to be gutted, seismically braced and sprinklered like the rest of the building and then earns nothing. Against it the model sets a completed value of $366K a home, which for 72 homes is $26.4M.

What would have to be true

A $7.0M gap before any grant, $2.6M after the modeled one. The smallest single change that would close it: average unit size 9% down.

The shortfall before any grant is $7.0M. Closing it from the value side means each of the 72 homes finishing at $463K rather than the $366K the model assumes — 26% more. Closing it from the cost side means getting all-in cost down from $405 to $320 per square foot.

A modeled RESIDE grant of $4.3M moves that threshold to $403K a home. That is still above the $366K assumed, leaving $2.6M uncovered, which is why the grant does not unlock this one.

Nor do all four levers have to move. For 950 Minna St, one alone would close the gap at:

All four are sliders in the survey, where 950 Minna St re-scores against your own numbers.

How it compares in Downtown San Francisco

950 Minna St ranks 131st of the 205 buildings screened here, against a median score of 87.

Its floor plate is better lit than 36% of them, and shallower than 46% of them at its deepest interior point. On size it is the 145th 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 South of Market and the C-3-G zone

8th of 14 in South of Market, 11th of 22 zoned C-3-G — the comparison that shares its rules, rents and streets.

San Francisco places 14 of the screened buildings in South of Market. 950 Minna St ranks 8th of them against a median score of 82. 9 score 70 or more, their median deepest interior point is 45 ft from a facade against this building’s 51 ft, and together they would hold an estimated 2,045 homes. The group’s top scorer is 431 Natoma St, at 100.

22 of the screened buildings are zoned C-3-G. 950 Minna St ranks 11th of them against a median score of 76. 13 score 70 or more, their median deepest interior point is 51 ft from a facade against this building’s 51 ft, and together they would hold an estimated 2,588 homes. The group’s top scorer is 40 Leavenworth St, at 92.

Its nearest match in size: 234 1st St

The screened building closest to 950 Minna St in converted floor area is 234 1st St: 81,356 sq ft over 7 stories, against 82,250 sq ft over 6 here.

950 Minna St scores 76 to its 93, and with the size held roughly equal most of that shortfall comes from daylight efficiency: 84 out of 100 here, 100 there (96% of the floor area within 35 ft of a facade, scored from 40% up to 90%). On the money they part ways: 234 1st St pencils only with the modeled RESIDE grant, while 950 Minna St falls short even with the modeled grant. The two stand about 7,600 ft apart.

Would it qualify for a RESIDE Act grant?

The model awards 950 Minna St $4.3M, 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 950 Minna St

The 4 closest the screen also covers, from 620 ft away. They are the colored outlines on the plan at the top of this page.

• 875 Stevenson St
  10 stories · 67% daylit · 228 estimated homes · scores 58/100 (Worth a feasibility study)
  about 620 ft away
• 1525 Market St
  8 stories · 49% daylit · 238 estimated homes · scores 27/100 (Unlikely)
  about 690 ft away
• 1563 Mission St
  5 stories · 90% daylit · 40 estimated homes · scores 82/100 (Strong candidate)
  about 780 ft away
• 32 9th St
  11 stories · 66% daylit · 547 estimated homes · scores 45/100 (Marginal)
  about 790 ft away