One of the last vacant lots on San Francisco’s Telegraph Hill is now the site of a contemporary four-story house with dramatic views of downtown, the Bay Bridge and other parts of the city.
The residence at 117 Telegraph Hill Blvd., which is listed for about $7.9 million, also enjoys a close-up look at Coit Tower, a historical structure at the crest of the hill dating from 1933. The publicly accessible tower is known for its own striking views of the city and the social realism murals at its base.
Lydia Sarkissian, her daughter Magdealena Sarkissian and William Bullock of Golden Gate Sotheby’s International Realty are co-listing the property, which was built together with two adjoining and similarly styled houses in 2024. The late Lewis Butler, of Butler Armsden Architects, designed the houses before he died in 2020.
“When you look south, you’re at line’s-eye height with the top of the [downtown] skyline," Kevin Dwyer, Golden Gate’s chief marketing officer, told Homes.com. "So, it has this jewel-box feeling.”
The house for sale has four bedrooms, an elevator and staircase connecting them, a roof deck above the fourth-floor primary suite, and a small garden at the house’s base. While the house is largely physically separated from its two neighbors, they share a garage and parts of the garden.
Construction of the house was delayed due to supply chain issues during the pandemic, Lydia Sarkissian told Homes.com, and also because it was challenging to obtain local government approval to build in a high-traffic area across the street from one of the city’s better-known landmarks.
“Getting buildings done in that area is a huge undertaking, logistically, and to get them approved,” she said.
Few of the houses visible from Telegraph Hill Boulevard actually front on that street. While the house has access to one parking spot in the garage, there’s also a publicly accessible walkway and stairs that connect down to Filbert Street. There are stairs to Coit Tower, directly across from the front door.
The house was first sold last March for $7.3 million, Sarkissian said. That owner went on to start a business in nearby Marin County and decided Telegraph Hill was too inconvenient a location.
Sarkissian and Dwyer emphasized how three of the floors have en suite bedrooms, meaning they have their own private bathrooms.
“The layout is very five-star hotel feeling,” Dwyer said. “Whoever buys this house is going to entertain and have guests, and the way it was designed for that level of privacy, despite the compact nature of it, is really something interesting about the place,” Dwyer said.
