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How to read a property record, where San Francisco's own rules decide the answer, and what the records will not tell you. Written for whoever is holding the document — a buyer, a renter, an owner, an agent, an investor or developer, an underwriter placing cover or credit, or the board of an association that has just inherited somebody else's deferred maintenance.
10 guides for hoa and property management, including the ones written for everybody. Show all 20.
How to read a report
Forty-two sections in the order they matter, what each comparison actually claims, and the three places the report is deliberately silent.
about 5 minutes · Aug 2026 For contractors and tradesWhat to check before you bid
The public record on a building before you send a proposal: what is already open, what an inspector already flagged, and what a soft-story obligation is worth knowing before you price the job.
about 3 minutes · Aug 2026 For owners and landlordsOwning, letting and selling
Your own building's public record, read the way a buyer's agent will read it — and the handful of things worth settling before it is read for you.
about 3 minutes · Aug 2026 For anyone holding a reportWhat this report will not tell you
The refusals are deliberate and worth knowing: no score, no person, no valuation — and the gaps in the records themselves.
about 3 minutes · Aug 2026 For anyone in San FranciscoEarthquakes, ground and hazard zones
Six different things people call “seismic risk”, what each one actually is in San Francisco, and the one this report cannot tell you.
about 4 minutes · Aug 2026 For everyoneWho to actually call in San Francisco
This report is a record. These are the people who decide — the Rent Board, DBI, the Assessor, and the organizations that help for free.
about 5 minutes · Aug 2026 ReferenceThe words San Francisco uses
3R, Costa-Hawkins, Maher, blklot, CFC, Tier 4. A reference for the terms that turn up in a report and nowhere else.
about 4 minutes · Aug 2026 For insurers and the brokers placing coverInsuring a San Francisco building, from the public record
What the city files about condition and hazard — fire citations, open violations, the retrofit list, the flood and fault zones — and the four things an underwriter needs that are not in there at all.
about 5 minutes · Aug 2026 For HOA boards and property managersCondo boards, HOAs, and the work outstanding
Which buildings the Assessor classes as condominium, what the city has cited them for and never closed, and how an association finds the capital obligations it has inherited before they find it.
about 4 minutes · Aug 2026 For anyone watching the record dailyWhat San Francisco files every day
The kinds of filing San Francisco publishes against its buildings and storefronts, how far behind each one runs, and why a list built on the filing date misses most of what was filed.
about 4 minutes · Aug 2026Then read the record on an actual address
One San Francisco address, one report: the Assessor's file, permits and violations, zoning, hazards and the published earthquake maps, rent control, and ten years of the surrounding blocks — every count compared with the city, and none of it scored.
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