MILE MARKERS ON THE ROAD TO DETROIT: Downtown Frisco tower once worth $320 million went to auction. Nobody made an offer.
One of San Francisco’s notable office towers was up for auction last week, a 20-story, 360,000-square-foot Class A building on one of the most coveted corridors in the North Financial District. Nobody who showed up to the stretch of sidewalk in the shadow of City Hall where the sale was held Thursday was there to bid on the polished, quietly assertive building that was once valued at over $320 million.
It’s a bit of a reckoning for the property at 600 California St., which was tied to a distressed $240 million loan and pushed into receivership after its former anchor tenant WeWork stopped paying rent three years ago. With no contenders stepping forward to offer bids, Dallas-based Lone Star Funds became the official owner of the property, after the private equity group paid roughly $130 million to acquire the debt in January from Goldman Sachs, the original lender.
The quiet transaction felt closer to a casual curbside deal than a high-stakes transfer of a notable piece of the city’s skyline. Some market participants pointed out that 600 California’s anticlimactic sale underscores continued weakness in the office market, challenging claims of full recovery.
Also news out of Detroit by the Bay:
Broken windows theory strikes again. https://t.co/iWtFvqP8jh
— Will Rinehart (@WillRinehart) April 21, 2026