Lenders Delay Foreclosure Auction for San Francisco Centre

The lenders that had San Francisco’s struggling San Francisco Centre mall dumped in their laps can’t determine when to auction it to the highest bidder. The value of the mall has plunged $1 billion.

Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase and other stakeholders of the mall’s commercial mortgage-backed securities loan for the third time pushed back the foreclosure auction of the 1.45 million-square-foot mall at 865 Market Street, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

First scheduled for November, then skipped twice, the mall auction was planned for Feb. 20 on Van Ness Avenue — but called off again for undisclosed reasons.

The next auction of the city’s largest mall is slated for March 27, according to the website of First American Title, which is among the companies managing the auction.

Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase and other lenders are owed $625.6 million by Brookfield Properties, based in New York, and Westfield, a unit of Paris-based Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, which walked away from the former Westfield San Francisco Centre’s ownership position last year.

The lenders sued Brookfield and Westfield after they stopped making payments on a $558 million loan backed by the retail center near Union Square.

A San Francisco Superior Court judge appointed Newport Beach-based Trident Pacific Real Estate Group as the property’s receiver. If no bidder emerges for the mall, the lenders would assume ownership, according to the Chronicle.

The once-popular indoor mall, now half-empty, has been bleeding tenants both large and small. Many have cited San Francisco’s inability to maintain public safety and downtown street condition for their exits.

Earlier this month, Inglewood-based Burke Williams Day Spa announced it will be draining its luxury pools on the fifth floor after it closes on April 28. Its announcement came weeks after Bloomingdale’s said it would be shutting the doors of its 339,000-square-foot flagship store in the mall next month.

Nordstrom closed its 312,000-square-foot flagship store in 2023 after 35 years at the mall, citing public safety concerns.

Then Cinemark’s 52,000-square-foot Century 9 movie house, across from Burke Williams, turned off its projectors. Other tenants to close up shop include Adidas, J. Crew, Hollister and American Eagle. By early last year, the mall had lost an estimated $1 billion in value, The Real Deal reported.

On the upside, the mall attracted seven new tenants, including kitchen goods store Mi Cocina and Japanese retailer Merkado, according to media reports.

— Dana Bartholomew