Riddle me this — if as the article says, San Francisco is a city of empty storefronts and missing young people, why are homes and real estate still the most expensive in the USA?
I would expect that if there is a mass exodus, the price of real estate would drop.
The price of real estate that is not tied up in a 12 year lawsuit is rising because of scarcity. The preimum for legal problem free is rising. The number of property owners waiting on a set of permits to become another class of property is well documented.
The case of a SF laundromat owner who wants to develop the land his family has owned for 40+ years into mix use multilateral earthquake ready low rise is well documented. He has been fighting city hall for 20+ years about the same block.
...the price of real estate would drop.
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It has. The ultra and nouveau riche put their savings into real estate, typically large mansions in the trendy urban areas of blue states. For years, now, the tabloids run stories of how some star has finally (after years on the market) unloaded one of these properties for less than they paid for it, after dropping the prices several times.
When you see a property listing, remember that the ask is only a wish. The realtor will always state it is ‘perfectly priced’, but will gently encourage the seller to cut the ask over time. To the buyer, they will add that the seller is ‘motivated’.