A family thought they had found a dream property in North Beach, a rare single-family home with a roof deck and four spacious bedrooms. But somewhere in its last couple of renovations, a previous owner did something they shouldn't have.

It does indeed look like a beautiful, newly renovated home, tucked in the middle of a block of mostly apartments on Vallejo Street, just below Telegraph Hill. The listing photos, apparently from when it was last on the market in 2021, show an open floorplan on the top level, featuring a well appointed kitchen, and skylights bringing in light from the roof deck above.

Floating stairs separated by a wall of glass lead down to what appears to be a floor of just bedrooms, with a master suite featuring a steam shower. And a back patio is partially enclosed by walls of attractively weathering COR-TEN steel.

The listing says the building type is "multi-family," which would probably raise eyebrows, because the photos say otherwise. And as a realtor, Jennifer Rosdail, tells the Chronicle, the current owners took a "calculated risk" in purchasing the home, hoping that they would be able to navigate the bureaucracy necessary to get an illegal conversion legitimized.

Those owners, Katelin Holloway and Ben Ramirez, have now lived in the home at 524-526 Vallejo Street for almost five years, and the bureaucracy has proven daunting. Their case landed before the Planning Commission last year, as the Chronicle reports, which deadlocked 3-3 on whether to approve the couple's plan to add back a studio unit on the ground floor — adding back another kitchen. And now their appeal will soon go before the Board of Supervisors — hence the press attention they clearly wanted in speaking to the Chronicle.

For tenants' advocates, it's a matter of principle that simply because the couple paid $4.75 million and they weren't responsible for making the unpermitted alterations, they shouldn't get a free pass. And the supervisors may abide by that principle and say that the couple will have to build back three more kitchens and re-subdivide their home so that it matches what is on city plans.

Three tenants were reportedly bought out before one of the previous renovations, and the story seems a bit unclear as to when the single-family conversion occurred, and who was responsible. But building inspectors say they believe they have identified six other buildings associated with a previous owner or owners where similar unpermitted unit mergers may have occurred.

Getting unit mergers approved, as the Chronicle notes, is typically an uphill battle with the city, because the loss of housing units is frowned upon.