Report: Apartment conversions in California are up by 25% compared to pre-pandemic levels, but are sluggish in the Bay Area

Apartment conversions in California are up by 25% compared to pre-pandemic levels, and most of them are in former office buildings, according to a new report from RentCafe.

Almost 2,000 converted apartments have been delivered in California since the pandemic started, according to the report.  But adaptive reuse in the Bay Area is moving slowly in the region:

• Berkeley surpassed San Francisco in terms of converted apartments and is the third highest in the state. Here, 205 apartments were created inside a former healthcare building during the pandemic years.
• San Francisco converted only one office building – Common Powell – in the past two years, which resulted in merely 58 apartments. There are currently 500 apartments under conversion in San Francisco, in a hotel and a former religious facility.
• Oakland is almost on par with San Francisco, with 66 converted apartments resulted from the repurposing of the historic Hotel Menlo, built in 1914. Additionally, the city has 129 apartments under conversion in the Z Hotel.