The California real estate empire of Mosser Living, a company that owns 61 buildings in San Francisco but has been selling off parts of its portfolio, could lose another 428 housing units in the coming months, according to documents obtained by Mission Local.
Mosser is one of the largest corporate landlords in San Francisco. The company, founded in 1955, received receivership orders for 14 of its San Francisco buildings — 13 residential and one commercial — between June 5 and Oct. 15.
Receivership typically occurs when two parties, like a landlord and a lender, are in disagreement. The affected buildings are in the Tenderloin, Nob Hill, Pacific Heights, SoMa and Hayes Valley, and house 428 units.
While receivership does not, on its own, mean buildings are for sale, many have already received notices for public auction.
“Notices of trustee sale,” which indicate a default on a loan and a subsequent sale, were sent to six Mosser buildings between August and October that house 141 units. Those face imminent foreclosure if Mosser doesn’t come to an agreement with its lender, JP Morgan Chase.
The rest of the buildings could soon follow. If Mosser offloads them, the sales would continue a trend in which the firm is shedding properties. The real-estate company, which owns 3,500 units in California, has struggled to recover from the pandemic.
Mosser has already lost at least 14 buildings in the last two years. In early 2024, the company defaulted on a $88 million loan, losing 12 buildings with 459 apartments. In September, the company defaulted on two loans totaling more than $26 million for two properties: the Hotel North Beach and the apartment complex at 1499 California St.
Large corporate property owners like Mosser and Veritas, once San Francisco’s largest landlord, have defaulted on tens of millions in loans in the past years. Loss of rental income during the pandemic, high interest rates, and the uncertain future of San Francisco’s housing market have made it difficult for city landlords to pay off debt.
Mosser owes $73.8 million to JP Morgan Chase for 13 of the buildings, and $9.8 million to Lone Oak Fund LLC for one property, according to court records. It has not made payments on most of the loans since November 2024.
Those 14 properties were subsequently placed under receivership, which occurs when two parties own something jointly and are in disagreement, said Jackson Wyche, a partner at Receivership Specialists, a firm that oversees receiverships.
The court then appoints a “neutral third party” to oversee the asset — in this case, the 14 buildings — “while the dispute plays out in court,” Wyche said.
Mosser’s holdings are vast. Its website claims it owns 3,500 units in California and lists 61 buildings in San Francisco, 14 in Oakland, and two in Los Angeles. Many house rent-controlled units.
Mosser has also been embroiled in a family rivalry. The company was founded by Charles Mosser in 1955. A law school dropout, Mosser was described in his obituary as a “voracious dealmaker” who considered it a sin to sell property once it was acquired and owned more than 35 apartment buildings and four hotels at the time of his death in 2007.
In 2024, the Mosser siblings, a son and a daughter, openly struggled over the future of the family business: Deborah Mosser requested a San Francisco court to remove her brother, Nuevo Mosser, from his role as head of the company, for alleged mismanagement
The company and its CEO, Neveo Mosser, did not reply to a request for comment.
While not all receiverships lead to foreclosures, both of Mosser’s lenders are seeking foreclosure of all 14 properties, according to court documents.
Three buildings — those at 400-402 Pierce St., 415 Pierce St. and 765 Geary St. — are set for a public auction on Nov. 20. The amount JP Morgan Chase is requesting in order to forestall that auction is $17,045,037, a mixture of overdue payments and late fees. Three others had auctions in the past, and the owner of those buildings today is unclear.
Mosser has 20 days to respond to any notices of trustee sale, but those sales are often postponed, 30 days at a time, so the two sides can arrange a deal. Postponements in cases like these are extremely common, said Sarah Shapero, a real estate attorney.
Steven Edrington, a real estate broker and real estate expert, suspected that Mosser may not be meeting its debt-service coverage ratio — the ratio between a business’ revenue and the debt it has to pay back. That, he said, may be leading them to sell of units.
“I think that’s the issue,” said Edrington. “They have too many vacancies. They’ve had to lower the rent and there’s also higher operating costs.”
No more corporate landlords! The city should use some of that Prop C money to buy these up and make them permanently affordable!
Yeah between corporate landlords and bank-managed receieverships that’s a lot of uncertainty and paperwork and legal considerations just to live in a place. There’s nothing appealing about it, every little thing is more of an officious hassle.
Where is the City and County of San Francisco with tax exempt mortgage revenue bonds at the ready to scoop up these distressed properties at a discount for conservation as permanent affordable housing?
The numbers would not add up any more for the City then they do for corporate landlords. And the city’s track record running public housing is not stellar.
The fundamental problem is that the rents do not cover the outgoings because of rent control.
Ray you don’t read articles. The corporate landlords failed at their jobs because they didn’t lower rents to meet the market and thus had huge percentages of vacancies. They bit off way more than they could chew and tried to write it off, but the banks get their pound of flesh either way.
You need to get a “rent control” tattoo on your face or something to make it more obviously the only thing you ever, ever talk about. You are not a housing expert, but if you spent a minute to actually read something your outlook might improve over time. Try it.
Many landlords keep their units vacant, preferring to take the tax loss just to avoid getting a “lifer” tenant.
That is why thousands of units sit empty or get used for Airbnb.
Fundamentally your problem seems to be reading articles instead of just repeating “rent control” a dozen times. You’re dead wrong.
Mercy Housing has no business operating apartment buildings. I live in a senior apartment building that has unhealthy living conditions. All Hallows Community, 1711 Oakdale Ave. San Francisco, Ca. 94124 has the temperature inside the hallways at 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Tenants can’t step into the hallway without gasping for air to breathe, manager has the tenants in lockdown because of the extreme heat that is inside this sweat box that Mercy Housing calls an apartment building. Mercy Housing is killing us seniors/tenants here.
Doug Shoemaker is ED of Mercy Housing California made $295K/yr in 2023. Five other MHC execs make more than $200K. Another handful and change > $100K.
I agree. There is a dumb idea that if you build it you can fill it perpetuated by the media that claims there is a huge housing shortage, when the shortage is not so much in housing as it is in rational property management. The owners (often REITS) have no idea what is going on in “their” properties. There is zero concern for maintenance when the developers run the figures. No maintenance means no high end renters. Raising rents is not the answer in a building that is not properly managed or maintained. It is was, there would not be a lot of empty units.
You can work and afford something better! Rent control does’t work!
Yeah it does. Speculative buyers who mismange their properties and have large %’s of vacancies “doesn’t work” obviously.
READ BETTER LISA! Try it!
It definitely works.
Excellent reporting that affirms why Mission Local is my favorite news site in the world.
General ML comment etiquette has been, in the past, to say your piece – once – and then contemplate the other comments.
Occasionally being treated to a wry comment from the humble narrator.
Once and a while a newbie from Disqus comes along who feels they must dominate the ML comments section with their “insights” and insults IN CAPITAL LETTERS.
Obviously I have no control but do feel when it comes down to name calling and insulting other commentators – perhaps the moderator might step in. This ain’t SFist.
Thank you.
100% Agree. I obviously have no idea what spam and vitriol ML moderates out before we see it, but I can’t believe the recent comments about “learn how to read” and “blathering” are making it through. Definitely a sad turn towards the cesspool that is SFist
Either, the city or Mercy Housing, should nap up these properties, and convert them to affordable housing, instead of building that ugly high rise in the Richmond district, that Lurie wants to build.
Is it possible that they are purposely defaulting because they got some advanced notice on this sprinkler mandate that just came down the pipe? HOA’s, homeowners, and commercial renters will be in quite the bind.
Good thought. If it’s more than half empty and underwater already and they also get hit with that, it almost does make more $ sense just to throw in the towel rather than have to relocate everyone, renovate, then fill it back up after a year.
“Large corporate property owners like Mosser and Veritas, once San Francisco’s largest landlord, have defaulted on tens of millions in loans in the past years. Loss of rental income during the pandemic, high interest rates, and the uncertain future of San Francisco’s housing market have made it difficult for city landlords to pay off debt.”
You forgot to mention the elephant in the room. These buildings are rent-controlled. So rents are capped but expenses are not.
This limits the buyers of such buildings and, worst case, could mean such buildings are stuck in limbo. Often the only buyers are vulture and hedge funds, that believe that they can create turnover and so start getting market rents.
Rent control is obviously NOT the elephant, the debt of the company and the vacancies they accrued from refusing to lower the rents are.
Learn how to read things so you seem somewhat informed instead of constantly repeating “rent control” like an idiot savant.
The article is right there above for you to read what the actual experts think and guess what, you’re not quoted for a reason! Go figure.
San Francisco’s rent control is well known and yet those corporations chose to purchase those buildings. I’m thinking rent control is not at all the problem.
Gary, the problem is that rent control is constantly becoming more and more strict. So a purchase that might have made sense years ago no longer does. And the only thing a landlord can do then is either Ellis the building. Or sell it.
And whilst the Ellis/TIC route works fine for small landlords and buildings, nobody wants a 20-unit TIC and the City won’t let you condo convert a building that has been Ellis’ed.
RENT CONTROL IS NOT THE PROBLEM, READ THE ARTICLE TO FIND OUT WHAT THE ACTUAL PROBLEM WAS SPAMMER.
These problems never happen in buildings that are not under rent control.
How many of the buildings were purchased with the knowledge that the city would let tenants not pay rent for 3 years with no recourse?
Ask your buddy Trump who denied the pandemic existed and made it a thousand times worse, eh? It wasn’t just SF, FYI.
Notice : Ray has a long history of anti-renter blathering.
It has nothing to do with the actual articles. Ever.
Aka, me.
“vulture and hedge funds”
OT: I sometimes hear ppl arguing for a rent freeze. I tell them this would squeeze out mom and pop landlords and attract slumlords and private equity firms who believe they can jerk tenants around enough to make them leave so they can reset rent.
Yes, Daniel, call it the entropy of housing. If you punish the “nice mom’n’pop landlords and small local operators then they sell out. And the only buyers are the big, nasty vultures who know how to create turnover.
Just look at P{arkMerced. And Stuytown in NYC.