Blackstone has acquired the Four Seasons San Francisco for about $130 million, signaling renewed confidence in the city’s hotel market and broader recovery. (Santiago Mejia/Santiago Mejia / The Chronicle)
A major real estate player is doubling down on San Francisco, marking another sign of momentum in the city’s uneven but accelerating hospitality rebound.
Blackstone has closed its acquisition of the 277-room Four Seasons Hotel San Francisco at 757 Market Street, a property long regarded as one of the city’s top luxury hotels, the company said Monday, according to the San Francisco Business Times.
The deal, finalized at the end of November, is expected to land around $130 million, according to earlier reporting from the Wall Street Journal.
Even at that price – roughly $470,000 per room – the sale reflects the steep discount environment facing hotel owners across the city.
Valuations for major properties have fallen sharply in recent years amid slow-to-recover tourism, rising insurance costs and tough lending conditions.
The city’s largest hotel complex, the nearly 3,000-room Hilton Union Square and Parc 55, recently sold for $408 million – a staggering 75% drop from its 2016 appraisal.
Still, investors like Blackstone insist the market is finally turning a corner.
“This town has, of course, been through a brutal five-plus years, and now things are really starting to turn,” said Blackstone President Jon Gray in a recent LinkedIn video, crediting Mayor Daniel Lurie’s leadership and the “AI revolution” for the renewed energy.
“Major companies, like Anthropic and OpenAI – growing, leading to more business activity,” Gray said. “Tourism is going to come back. Very simply: buy some real estate here.”
City officials are making the same pitch.
“San Francisco is coming back, and major investments like this one show that momentum is building every day,” Lurie said in a statement last month. “Visitors are returning, conferences are coming back to San Francisco, and it’s a good time to bet on our city. We’re showing the world: San Francisco is open for business, and we’re on the rise.”
For Blackstone, the purchase marks its first San Francisco hotel acquisition in about a decade – and another high-profile vote of confidence that the city’s long-awaited recovery is inching forward.
This article originally published at Four Seasons San Francisco sold to Blackstone in $130 million deal.