It’s a sign of the times that renderings of condominiums which do not yet exist or have permits are shown on a real estate listing for the 112-year-old Regency Ballroom, which is now on the selling block.
The famed Regency Ballroom concert and banquet hall at Van Ness Avenue and Sutter Street has been in recent years leased to and managed by Goldenvoice, the same L.A-based entertainment outfit that runs the Warfield, the Great American Music Hall, and the Coachella Music Festival. Their parent company Anschutz Entertainment Group is owned by Philip Anschutz, whose politics are far out of line from most of the acts they book, and fans who buy tickets to these shows. But this has never disrupted the lucrative nature of their big-money concert tour bookings, COVID-19 is what disrupted concert tour bookings.
And it may or may not be pandemic economic fallout that’s led to the Regency being put up for sale, as first reported last week by the San Francisco Business Times. But in follow-up reporting over the weekend, the Chronicle notes that the venue "will continue to book concerts at the lower-level Regency Ballroom for the immediate future," with the president of listing realtor Compass Commercial California saying the “current operation will remain in place after the sale.”
That said, the listing for the property also says “for sale or full building lease,” so Goldenvoice may not have an ironclad permanent arrangement there.
But big changes may be coming on top of the venue, even if it remains a concert hall and rental venue. Check out the promotional rendering above, which depicts five stories of add-on condominiums which currently do not exist. The listing for the Regency says that “the zoning allows construction above the roofline for additional uses including residential and medical office condos. Successfully designing and merging these new and redevelopment options will forge a fresh legacy for the future.”
There's also a pretty nice drone fly-through video of the 65,000 square-foot interior, which does retain many vintage elements of its original 1909 incarnation as a Masonic Lodge. The place was a movie theater from 1he 1960s til the early 90s, and was last sold in 1997 for $3.7 million. Obviously, the San Francisco real estate market has... evolved since then.
It should be noted that anyone who wants to build condos on top of this will still have to go through San Francisco's intense permitting process, which could easily be stymied if historic preservationists decide to stand in the way.
The venue’s upcoming calendar does show that concerts are scheduled there through June 2022, with shows including Gwar, JPEGMAFIA, and the Wombats.
Related: Aqua Teen Hunger Force Doing Live Show at Regency Ballroom [SFist]
Top Image: Jenica P. via Yelp
