How Hosting the Super Bowl Signals a San Francisco Real Estate Renaissance

Real Estate News & Market Insights:

As the Seattle Seahawks prepare to face off against the New England Patriots on Sunday, Super Bowl LX host city San Francisco prepares to show off its recent revival after years of grappling with major economic and quality-of-life challenges.

Since taking office just over a year ago, Mayor Daniel Lurie has been busy cleaning up the city, from dismantling homeless encampments to cracking down on open drug use and car break-ins.

An estimated 1.3 million travelers are expected to pass through San Francisco International Airport by Feb. 10, with roughly 90,000 visitors attending Super Bowl–related events, giving Lurie, a tough-on-crime moderate Democrat, an opportunity to present a refreshed image of the city to a global audience.

“With all eyes on San Francisco, I am confident that we will deliver a fun and safe week for our residents and visitors,” Lurie said at a Super Bowl week kickoff briefing on Monday. “San Francisco is at the center of the action, and I could not be more excited.”

In 2025, overall crime in San Francisco was down 30% citywide and 40% in the downtown area, with violent crime dropping 22% and car break-ins reaching 22-year lows, according to Lurie’s administration.

San Francisco’s homelessness crisis, which has made the city a national symbol of failed progressive policies for critics, has also begun to recede.

According to the latest data from the Department of Emergency Management released in the summer, there were 165 tents across the city, down 85% from 1,108 in 2020.

At the same time, fatal drug overdoses have been trending down. By the end of 2025, 621 accidental overdose deaths were recorded in the “Golden City,” down from the record 810 in 2023.  

San Francisco’s AI-fueled boom

Now, the city is ready to show the country and the world how far it has come.

“San Francisco knows that this is their chance to shift the narrative,” real estate agent John Solaegui, with Compass, tells Realtor.com®.

The shift started with the election of Lurie, whom Solaegui describes as a “cheerleader” for the city.

While San Francisco’s renaissance is still in its early stages, businesses, professionals, and homebuyers have begun to take notice, giving the local housing market a welcome boost fueled by Silicon Valley’s artificial intelligence boom.

“The vibe has completely changed in San Francisco in the last year or so,” says Solaegui. “And then most recently, the market has shifted into high gear. And the common line is that the AI money is all over San Francisco.”

The agent explains that beginning last fall, founders and employees of AI companies have gone on a buying spree, snapping up houses and condos across the city, signaling a renewed confidence in San Francisco.

“The biggest driver in our resurgent market right now is that there are so many buyers,” says Solaegui. There are just more buyers than there are homes for sale, so there’s an imbalance there.

How San Francisco’s housing market has changed

Recent housing data analyzed by Realtor.com researchers confirms the agent’s observation: While home prices have softened across much of the San Francisco metro, the selling pace has picked up, with listings spending less time on the market in December than a year ago and inventory tightening—signs of growing demand.

“Nearly all central ZIP codes with sufficient data show lower inventory levels compared with last year, even as asking prices have generally trended lower, likely helping to draw buyers back into the market,” says Realtor.com senior economic research analyst Hannah Jones.

However, two ZIP codes—94105, which covers parts of the pricey Financial District and South of Market (SoMa) neighborhoods, and 94133, which encompasses the famed North Beach, Chinatown, and Telegraph Hill sections—stood out, posting year-over-year price gains of over 50%.

For example, in December, the typical for-sale home in the 94133 ZIP code was listed for nearly $3.5 million, up from $2.3 million a year ago. 

“In these areas, listing prices per square foot also rose sharply, up 24.9% in 94105 and 14.3% in 94133, making them notable outliers amid broader price softening across central San Francisco,” says Jones.

The median home list price for the broader San Francisco metro stood at $872,000 in December, down 2% from a year ago, according to the latest monthly housing market trends report from Realtor.com.

Solaegui advises clients looking to buy in San Francisco to be fully prepared and have their financing in place, as homes move quickly and bidding wars are common—especially for trophy properties.

The agent’s client list includes buyers not only from around the U.S., but also from around the world looking to purchase property in San Francisco this year.

“I have so many clients who are born in other countries who have come here to start a new company or to make a new life,” he says.

“San Francisco attracts a very special brand of person,” he adds. “It attracts people who are resilient and creative and willing to take risks.”

New mayor cracks down on crime

Lurie, a 48-year-old political newcomer and heir to the Levi Strauss clothing fortune, defeated incumbent London Breed, a fellow Democrat, in November 2024 after making crime reduction and revitalization the centerpieces of his campaign.

In a recent interview on ABC’s “This Week With George Stephanopoulos,” Lurie said his administration was committed to refocusing government on the basics and common sense, with public safety at the center.

“Now today, if you come to San Francisco to commit a crime, we’re going to catch you and we’re going to prosecute you,” Lurie said. “If you come to San Francisco to deal drugs or to do drugs, we’re going to prosecute you.”

Solaegui says the mayor’s strategy has been paying off.

“Safety is the bedrock of anyone selecting a neighborhood and a home,” he says. “They want to make sure that they and their family and their friends are safe.”

The agent points out, however, that past media portrayals of San Francisco as a lawless city littered with hypodermic needles were unfair.

“San Francisco is a collection of neighborhoods, and there are some neighborhoods that have those issues, but then there are a lot of neighborhoods that have just regular people living in them that have always been safe, even during the worst part of all the news coverage that we were having,” says Solaegui. “If people are hearing the story that the streets are unsafe, then they believe it and they might be more hesitant to buy a home.”

Lurie has worked to counter that perception through daily social media posts promoting San Francisco, even as he acknowledges that challenges remain.

“I’m not going to sit here and say you can’t go down a few of our streets and see some of the things you saw in the last few years, but we’ve made great strides,” he said in the interview.

As part of his ground-up approach to improving city life, Lurie has also focused on getting rid of outdated or ineffective rules that have long irked San Franciscans.

A year into his mayoral term, Lurie has eliminated a rule requiring homeowners to build a screen or fence to shield their driveway from neighbors if they wished to park their car there, reported the New York Times.

Another city ordinance that has fallen by the wayside under Lurie’s leadership in response to complaints from businesses had required restaurant owners wishing to use candles in their dining rooms to go to the city’s permit office, candle in hand, light it, and wave a napkin over it to prove that it would not catch fire.

In the grand scheme, both are minor fixes, but for Lurie, small, everyday details add up—and can make a real difference in constituents’ lives.

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