San Francisco Yields Top Out at 4.4%, Half the US Median

Yields across 28 San Francisco ZIP codes range from 4.4% in Financial District (94188) down to under 2% in the most expensive neighborhoods. Because the city prohibits short-term rentals of investment properties, almost every investor here is a long-term rental landlord by default, which makes suburb selection the single biggest lever on return. This ranking shows which neighborhoods lead on gross yield, and why the spread is so pronounced in a market whose city-wide median sits at just 2.3%.

Before the table, one regulatory note that shapes every choice below. Short-term rentals heavily restricted in San Francisco. Investment properties generally not permitted; may require owner occupancy, specific zoning, or other conditions (permit required, $925). San Francisco prohibits short-term rentals of investment properties; only primary residences are eligible. Owner-occupants who rent while absent are capped at 90 days per year. Registration with the Office of Short-Term Rentals costs $925 for a 2-year certification. 14% Transient Occupancy Tax plus Tourism Improvement District fee. Source: Airbnb. For investment buyers the practical read is simple: cash flow comes from long-term tenants, and the nightly-rate column you might see on a Nashville or Austin ranking does not exist here in any meaningful way. Every yield figure below is a long-term rental yield.

Financial District (94188) Leads on Yield, With a Clear Second Tier Behind It

Gross yields = annual rent divided by sale price. Based on 3-bed house medians. Short-term rental yields are not shown because San Francisco prohibits investor-owned short-term rentals. The dashboard carries every property type and bedroom count per ZIP.

Entry Price, Not Rent Level, Drives the Top of the Ranking

Financial District (94188) tops the list for a single reason: it is the cheapest entry point in the city at $630,161, roughly a third of the city-wide 3-bed median of $1,734,060. The rent of $2,334 is nothing remarkable in absolute terms, but the denominator is small enough that the ratio outperforms every other neighborhood in the dataset. This is a classic yield-leader pattern in premium coastal cities, where the top of the ranking is almost always defined by depressed prices rather than exceptional rents.

Bayview/Hunters Point (94124) follows at 4.1% and illustrates a different driver, rental demand rather than cheap entry. The neighborhood sits in the southeast quadrant of the city with heavy industrial legacy, Muni T-line connectivity, and steady blue-collar and contract-worker tenant flow. Rent of $2,955 against a sale price of $875,000 produces the second-best ratio in the city. Investors who prefer a more stable tenant pool, including workforce rentals tied to the shipyard redevelopment and nearby hospital jobs, often rank this area higher than the raw number suggests.

SoMa (94103) rounds out the top three at 4.0%. Unlike the first two, this is a genuinely high-rent area: $4,817 per month reflects walkable access to downtown employment, transit, and nightlife. The yield holds up because the sale price of $1,442,588 is moderated by a dense supply of condo-format stock, which pulls the 3-bed house median down relative to single-family-dominated neighborhoods further west. For an investor comfortable with high-density product and the associated HOA and special-assessment risks, this is one of the few San Francisco submarkets where strong rent and relatively contained capital outlay both exist.

The Yield Premium at the Top Comes With a Lower Capital-Risk Ceiling

The yield-price trade-off in San Francisco is unusually sharp. An investor entering at $630,161 in Financial District (94188) commits roughly a third of the capital required for the city-wide median house at $1,734,060, and far less than a buyer in the city's most expensive ZIPs, where 3-bed houses run up to $3,600,000. That is a structurally different risk profile: smaller absolute dollar exposure to interest rate movements, easier debt serviceability, and a smaller deposit check. The trade is that the capital growth story in these cheaper neighborhoods tends to be weaker than in the established west-side and peninsula-adjacent areas, where decade-over-decade appreciation has been the real engine of investor returns.

Premium buyers accept low yield because they are paying for something the income number does not capture: scarce school catchments, view amenity, low crime, and historically faster appreciation. In San Francisco this is particularly pronounced because total returns have historically been dominated by price growth, not rent, and a 2% yield on a $3M house has produced better long-run outcomes than a 4.4% yield on a $600K house across most rolling ten-year windows. The ranking below makes the trade-off concrete.

For Context: San Francisco's Best-Known Neighborhoods

For context, here is how some of San Francisco's most in-demand suburbs compare. These are established neighborhoods where investors typically accept lower yields in exchange for capital growth, liquidity, and tenant quality.

High-demand neighborhoods for context. Same methodology as the yield ranking above.

These neighborhoods yield less on long-term rental because the purchase price reflects non-income attributes, school zones, view amenity, proximity to employment nodes like the peninsula tech corridor, and a long track record of capital growth. Because San Francisco does not permit investor-operated short-term rentals, there is no short-term rental route to rescue the yield on a premium purchase here. The thesis has to be appreciation and land-value growth, not cash flow.

What the Yield Ranking Does Not Show

The ranking above is a snapshot, and snapshots flatter certain neighborhoods in ways investors should understand before committing capital. A high yield can mean depressed prices as much as strong rents, and in Financial District (94188) and Bayview/Hunters Point (94124) the low entry price is partly a reflection of condo-heavy 3-bed stock, thinner sale comparables, and HOA exposure that the headline yield does not capture. Capital growth is the other blind spot: premium west-side and peninsula-adjacent neighborhoods have historically delivered stronger total returns, income plus growth, than the high-yield east-side ZIPs, and a buyer optimizing purely for yield may give up the better long-run outcome.

Vacancy risk and rent-control exposure also differ by neighborhood. San Francisco's rent stabilization ordinance covers most buildings built before June 1979, and the practical effect is that a long-tenure tenant in a covered unit can keep rent well below market for years. Neighborhoods dominated by pre-1979 stock, which includes a large share of the premium west-side areas, carry meaningfully different cash-flow behavior than newer-construction ZIPs like Mission Bay/Dogpatch (94158). The dashboard surfaces rent and price by ZIP, but a buyer needs to pair that with the building vintage of any specific property.

View San Francisco in the dashboard → Free preview · every bedroom count and property type

San Francisco Sits Below Both California and the US Median, Even at the Top of the Ranking

The city-wide gross yield of 2.3% is below the California state median of 4.0% and well below the US national median of 5.3%. The top-ranked neighborhood, Financial District (94188) at 4.4%, just edges past the California median but still trails the national figure by a meaningful margin. For an investor whose decision set is purely cash-flow, California has cheaper, higher-yielding inland markets in the Central Valley and desert regions where gross yields above 10% are common, albeit with entirely different tenant demographics and vacancy risk. San Francisco's case as an investment market is not the yield number, it is the appreciation thesis layered on top of a tight-regulation, tight-supply environment. The dashboard shows the income side of that picture by ZIP. The growth side depends on your view of the city over the next decade.

For readers weighing San Francisco against other California options, Los Angeles Yields 3.7% as Investors Bet on Appreciation and Oakland's 3.0% Yield Means Appreciation Must Do the Heavy Lifting cover the same question for different markets.

Data reflects market conditions as of April 2026. Explore rental data in the dashboard for every ZIP, bedroom count, and property type, or review the market score methodology and data sources.

This information is for educational purposes only and should not be considered financial or legal advice. Regulations and market conditions change frequently. Verify current rules with local authorities before making investment decisions.