Pinterest Paid $90M to Break Lease in SOMA, Other Tech Giants May Follow

Big Tech Stuck in BIG LEASES in Downtown SF

Now that everyone is working from home in the tech industry, massively expensive office space in one of the most expensive cities in the world, has officially become a liability.  When companies like Pinterest are willing to pay $9o million dollars to get out of their lease in San Francisco, you realize how big of a liability paying commercial rent has become.

88 Bluxome is still under development. Ironically this image did come from pinterest.

‘Eighty-eight Bluxome’, located in China Basin, by the 4th and King Caltrain station, is one of the city’s biggest new developments. When completed, it will have two office high-rises, ground-floor retail shops, 12 indoor tennis courts and multiple swimming pools.  Good luck renting that shit out now boys.

But what about the biggest, swinging dildo in the office known as Salesforce?  In 2018 Salesforce singed a 15.5 years lease, for a total of $774 million to be in SF’s largest tower.   That’s just under $50 million dollars in rent per year, for office space and conference space they now cannot use.

Facebook and Instagram both leased massive building spaces adjacent to the Salesforce center in the last three years, in fact in 2017-2019 many of biggest silicon valley players couldn’t sign leases fast enough to be in San Francisco’s Salesforce office bubble, with buildings that had exclusive access to the TransBay Transit Center City Park.

70 stories of facebook at 181 Fremont.

Facebook’s rent in 2017 was estimated at $35 Million.  Which sounds like an ENORMOUS sum to a normal person, until you realize that Facebook made $70.7 billion dollars in 2019.  In other words, they can afford to light $35 million dollars on fire everyday if they want.  That’s how much money they suck out of cyberspace.

But what about actual office space in the real world.  How long before other tech giants begin cutting ties with San Francisco, as their employees all opt to work from home, and overpriced office space becomes obsolete.

Personally, I hope they all move out, and we can return to having weird, unsanctioned warehouse parties in whichever abandoned SOMA building we choose.  Also, let’s turn the ‘Salesforce Center’ into housing for the homeless in 2020.