According to the New York Post, Serabeth Mullaney, a San Francisco tenant, received a $35,000 check on the condition that she vacate her current apartment; however, this eye-popping sum wasn’t enough to win her over, leaving her facing a quintessentially “San Francisco” dilemma.
Her landlord wants to reclaim the apartment and is willing to pay a five-figure sum to make it happen, but Mullaney says the nightmare of finding a new place to live might make the deal not worth it for her.
She has been documenting the situation on TikTok, where she explained what is holding her back from accepting the offer. “I think the only thing stopping me from taking the offer is the apartment hunt,” Mullaney said.
Mullaney described the search for a new home in the city as a “nightmare” and noted that the deal came with another condition: the landlord required her to sign a non-disclosure agreement.
In San Francisco’s heavily regulated rental market, paying tenants to move out is a common practice. Strict tenant protections prevent landlords from arbitrarily raising rents significantly for existing tenants. Paying tenants to vacate allows landlords to regain possession of the unit and subsequently charge rent that aligns with current market rates.
For Mullaney, however, the issue lies in what happens after she takes the money.
According to Zillow data, the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco is currently $4,500, and fierce competition has created a particularly difficult landscape for tenants: bidding wars erupt as soon as rental units hit the market.
While Mullaney has kept her specific address private, data from the San Francisco Rent Board indicates that many high-value tenant buyouts occur in neighborhoods with a history of rent control and high demand, such as the Mission, the Castro, Haight-Ashbury, and Pacific Heights. The $35,000 buyout she received might sound like a huge sum, but in reality, it sits right at the historical median for tenant buyouts in San Francisco—meaning some tenants have received far larger payouts.
The city’s record-breaking buyout occurred in Presidio Heights, where a couple in their sixties received $475,000 to vacate their seven-bedroom, rent-controlled apartment.
They had lived there for 30 years, paying $12,500 a month for a spacious, luxurious unit that offered sweeping, panoramic views of the Golden Gate Bridge.
This context makes the offer Mullany received particularly significant, especially as she weighed whether to give up her apartment—a difficult decision in a city where finding alternative housing can be extremely challenging.