Charles Schwab’s SF headquarters up for sale after moving to Texas
Before the COVID-19 pandemic hit the United States and businesses and residents began to flee San Francisco, Charles Schwab had already decided to move his headquarters to Texas.
Now, two years later, the 17-story office building of the financial services firm goes up for sale, as first reported by the San Francisco Business Times.
Charles Schwab still leases the entire building at 211 Main St. to SoMa, an agreement that runs until April 2028. The building was purchased by Blackstone Group in 2017 for approximately $ 313 million. The asking price is said to be around $ 400 million, according to the Business Times, which obtained a brochure stating that the prices are 25% below the market rate.
While Westlake, Texas will house the company’s new main office, “Schwab was founded in San Francisco and has maintained a long-standing commitment to the Bay Area, which will continue. Schwab continues to hire in the Bay Area and hopes to retain a footprint in the city, ”a company spokesperson told SFGATE.
While this sale cannot be blamed on the changing nature of work due to the pandemic, it is a pattern that is becoming common in San Francisco. After file hosting service Dropbox announced a switch to permanent remote work in October 2020, it sold its Mission Bay headquarters – a four-building complex at 1800 Owens St. – for $ 1.08 billion. dollars in April. Tech companies with a large office footprint like Salesforce and Twitter are also offloading office space.