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NPC-131072 writes:

From SFChronicle

A pending deal to sell almost half of Park Tower, one of San Francisco's tallest office buildings, could lead to $539 million changing hands and set the new skyscraper's value at more than a billion dollars — an almost unprecedented sum.

But the city will get nothing from the deal, at least in the form of the transfer taxes it collects on most sales of real estate.

That's because owners MetLife, John Buck Co. and Golub plan to sell a 49% stake in the property at 250 Howard St., where the office space is fully leased to Facebook.

Since less than half of the property is trading, the deal won't count as a change in ownership, exempting it from San Francisco's 3% transfer tax on deals over $25 million, said Jeffry Bernstein, a partner and tax expert at law firm Coblentz Patch Duffy & Bass. If it was subject to the tax, the city would receive more than $16 million.

[...] San Francisco voters increased the transfer tax on property sales over $5 million in a 2016 ballot measure, in an effort to make City College free for residents. While voters can change transfer tax rates, Bernstein said any efforts to make sales of partial ownership stakes subject to the tax would "have to come out of Sacramento."

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