50 N 1st St

50 N 1st St is a 6-story apartment building in Downtown San Jose. Its floor plate has 96% of its area within daylight reach of a facade and scores 97 out of 100 on this screen’s measures, which is part of why it works as housing.

CA-18 · Screened 2026-10-20 · Already housing

No address point in San Jose’s records falls inside this footprint, so it is named by the closest one that no other screened building claims — usually a site entrance, but check the outline on the plan below before relying on the street number.

Where 50 N 1st St is

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

Suitability score

0–29

30–49

50–69

70–100

Already housing
Not screened
50 N 1st St

50 N 1st St and the 1,000 ft of Downtown San Jose 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. 50 N 1st St is outlined in its own score color at the outline it covers at ground level. Its windowless core is hatched. The inset places it among every building the screen covers.

Floor plan: 96% of each floor sits within daylight reach of a facade. The shading is daylight, darkest at the windows and gone 35 ft in. The hatched area is windowless core: 1,919 sq ft per floor that must be renovated but can never be rented as an apartment. The dimension marks the deepest interior point, 44 ft from the nearest window. A–A is where the section beside it is cut.

Section A–A: cut across the depth of the plate, through the middle of the core. Daylight reaches 35 ft in from every facade, fading as it goes, and the hatched stripe left between the lit edges is floor that gets converted and can never be rented: 1,919 sq ft on the floor the screen scores, and 9,593 sq ft over 5 residential floors. The shaded ground floor is converted like the rest and counted as no homes.

This is already an apartment building: San Jose's rental housing and condominium records list 191 apartments here, and OpenStreetMap maps it as an apartment building. It is on the map because downtown zoning permits offices and homes alike, but this site does not count it as a conversion candidate.

Every floor carries 1,919 sq ft of windowless core — area that must be gutted, seismically braced and sprinklered but can never be rented as an apartment. Across 5 residential floors that is 9,593 sq ft of cost carrying no revenue.

Separated from its neighbors. The city’s map draws this building and the ones beside it as one outline with one height. This outline comes from OpenStreetMap, which maps them separately, and its floor count is OpenStreetMap’s.

Read with caution. This footprint carries 6 street addresses across 43,503 sq ft, which usually means the city’s GIS has merged a block or complex into a single polygon rather than describing one convertible building.

Modeled conversion metrics for 50 N 1st St, 2026-10-20.

Suitability scoreStrong candidate	97 / 100
Storiesfrom OpenStreetMap, “Building, way 435328007”, in place of the 72 ft LiDAR height ÷ 12 ft floor-to-floor	6
Floor plateper floor, from the city footprint	43,503 sq ft
Daylight efficiencyshare within 35 ft of a facade	96%
Deepest interior pointviability threshold is 80 ft	44 ft
Windowless coreper floor — renovated but never rentable	1,919 sq ft
BuiltSan Jose does not publish a construction year with this data	—
ZoningDowntown San Jose	DC
Opportunity Zonecensus tract 06085501000, 2018 designation	Yes

The plan: window line, shape and floor rhythm

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

The typical floor has 1,609 ft of exterior wall, and across 5 residential floors the building carries 8,044 ft of it in total, divided among the 221 homes this screen estimates.

Its plate is highly articulated at 0.21: a long, notched or wing-shaped outline with far more facade than its area needs — wasteful as an office envelope, and close to ideal for apartments. How window line and plate shape are measured.

At the model’s 750 sq ft average, the plan works out at about 44.2 homes per floor, repeated on every residential floor, since this building's outline does not change as it rises.

Why 50 N 1st St scores 97 out of 100

Daylight efficiency 100, Interior depth 89, Scale 100, Finance 100 — each out of 100, then weighted.

Score components for 50 N 1st St. Points are the subscore times its weight.

Component	Subscore	Weight	Points
Daylight efficiency96% of the floor area within 35 ft of a facade, scored from 40% up to 90%	100	45%	45.0
Interior depthdeepest interior point 44 ft from a facade, scored from 80 ft down to 40 ft	89	25%	22.2
Scale221 estimated homes, scored from 0 up to 150	100	15%	15.0
Financecompleted value covers conversion cost with 18% to spare, which tops out the component	100	15%	15.0

Most of what it earns comes from daylight efficiency, and what holds it back most is interior depth, at 89 out of 100: deepest interior point 44 ft from a facade, scored from 80 ft down to 40 ft.

Other buildings screened near 50 N 1st St

The 4 closest the screen also covers, from 330 ft away. They are the colored outlines on the plan at the top of this page.

4 N 2nd St
13 stories · 76% daylit · 182 estimated homes · scores 72/100 (Strong candidate)
about 330 ft away
75 E Santa Clara St
14 stories · 79% daylit · 182 estimated homes · scores 78/100 (Strong candidate)
about 440 ft away
12 S 1st St
13 stories · 100% daylit · 99 estimated homes · scores 95/100 (Strong candidate)
about 530 ft away
5 S 1st St
10 stories · 100% daylit · 58 estimated homes · scores 91/100 (Strong candidate)
about 540 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.