This Once-Great CA Mall Is Now 93% Vacant: Report

SAN FRANCISCO — Once a bustling commercial hub, the San Francisco Centre mall is now 93 percent vacant and hemorrhaging millions of dollars a year, The Wall Street Journal recently reported.

At nine stories and 1.5 million square feet, the mall lost about $20 million last year, according to the newspaper, citing an estimate provided by a person with knowledge of the matter — down from a $44.6 million net-operating income in 2019.

The coronavirus pandemic marked a turning point for the urban mall, with rising problems related to homelessness, drug use and shoplifting, and the departure of Nordstrom and Bloomingdale’s, the Journal reported.

“I think now, since the mall is empty, they try to get away with it a lot more,” Sole & Laces clerk Daniela Simental said of shoplifters and unhoused people, according to the newspaper.

The mall was turned over to lenders in 2023 and is set for a foreclosure auction in October, the Journal reported, adding San Francisco Centre had around 20 operational retailers during a recent lunch hour, down from roughly 200 before the pandemic. The mall was recently valued at just under $200 million, according to the newspaper.

Read more from The Wall Street Journal.