Sompac Article

Posted by AGI Capital on June 27, 2008 08:38 AM | Comments (0)

The South of Market Project Area Committee (Sompac), tasked with providing community feedback for Soma's 6th Street redevelopment area, highlighted the Avant project located at 5th and Folsom. "Avant Housing hopes to create a new, integrated way forward for positive, urban development." Quite a challenge, but tell us it ain't worth trying.

One Saturday and 60 Trees Later...

Posted by AGI Capital on March 19, 2008 06:15 AM | Comments (0)

SoMa's got a new urban forest lining the Tehama and Clementina alleyways between 4th and 6th streets. Thanks to everyone that came out, it was a great success!

A demonstration on how to correctly plant a tree.

Staci and Jesse take a break for a photo.

SoMa Tree Planting

Posted by AGI Capital on March 11, 2008 03:01 AM | Comments (0)

Grab your latte and come join us this Saturday morning as we work with our friends at ClementinaCares to help plant over 60 trees along the Clementina and Tehama alleyways. We'll be meeting at Luscious Garage located at 459 Clementina Street at 9am, planting trees throughout the morning, and then celebrating with a potluck when we're done! More info here.

Influence

Posted by AGI on December 30, 2007 06:12 PM | Comments (0)

This month lifestyle magazine 7x7 included AGI's President & CEO Alexis Wong in its annual list of San Francisco's 49 most influential people.

The magazine put Alexis in the "Bricks + Mortar" category where she accompanies David Gottfried, founder of the US Green Building Council, Laurence Kornfield, the City's chief building inspector, Dwight Alexander, the City's Planning Department president, and Maria Ayerdi, executive director for the Transbay Joint Powers Authority, among others.

That's some very good company -- but the magazine thinks its appropriate. As the editors wrote:

If you were a developer and your current pipeline of residential projects -- ones that bring a sophisticated gloss to otherwise-gritty areas of Oakland, Berkeley and San Francisco, including the new 246-unit Soma Grand on Mission -- was worth more than $750 million (and if you had roped in the investing clout of CalPERs and TMG), you'd be on this list too.

The obvious value of this kind of attention is that it helps AGI build greater brand equity in future dealings -- and of course the affirmation inspires us to continue improving ourselves and be better at what we do.

But perhaps more important, AGI Capital is a minority/woman-led business. Being tagged as a key civic leader here in San Francisco helps Alexis set an example. Simply put: being Asian or female shouldn't deter anyone from developing quality projects in this community.

So who would be on Ms. Wong's own list of influential people? Her grandmother first and foremost, she says. And probably another influential local Asian woman: Fiona Ma, the former San Francisco supervisor who is now State Assembly Majority Whip in Sacramento.

De Young Turns 1, Again

Posted by AGI on October 16, 2006 08:50 AM | Comments (0)

AGI made an appearance at the de Young's Starlight Evening on Saturday night to celebrate the 1 year anniversary of the de Young's face lift. We go to these things to get street cred with the architects and marketing creatives. Kidding. Highlights of the evening included the live Big Band ensemble, finally checking out the Quilts of Gee's Bend exhibit (awesome), and then having the Oceanic Arts all to ourselves because everyone was at the Gee's Bend exhibit.

But above all else, the winner of the evening was James Turrell's Three Gems. Possibly, nay, probably one of SF's greatest kept secrets. You have to seek it out because it is hidden, and most people don't even know it exists at all. But do yourself a favor and find it at night when it takes on an entirely different life (access is available at all times), sit quietly, and enjoy a totally insular experience in the heart of a city. It can blow your mind in the most subdued way possible.

We brought champagne, too, so maybe that helped.

Superman Sure Needed His

Posted by AGI on August 20, 2006 09:56 PM | Comments (0)

On a normal jaunt to City Hall to handle some typical permit stuff, I fell right into the lap of a block-party rife with DJ's, stilt walkers, the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, and 50 exotic dancers protesting a new proposed ordinance that would eliminate private dance booths in live adult theaters. The debate centers on the City's desire to curb abuse and assault allegedly taking palce in the booths versus the dancers' claim that shedding the booths would materially affect their livelihood.

There is clearly a simple design solution, our recommendation: a transparent glass door that can go opaque depending on the light setting, often used for single family home and hotel/condo bath interiors. The opaqueness could be instantly adjusted by the dancer if she feels threatened. A simple solution with a modern design aesthetic to mitigate, what we would imagine from hearsay, are generally dreary settings. The rough estimated costs, including new rough-in electrical, would run possibly $750 per door, a pittance based on what. . . as, we understand, is generally less than a night's take. Would try to ensure that the door works as a bar door (i.e., sufficient openings at the bottom and top, so that it should not require a permit). . . . and are confident there are contractors aplenty who would do the work for trade.

Introducing "Keeping It Real... Estate"

Posted by AGI on June 22, 2006 04:35 PM | Comments (1)

The purpose of a blog page for a San Francisco real estate developer...? Ask most real estate professionals and the answer is simple: none.

Most would say it's foolish. So why did we decide to include one on our site? Adding an interactive, responsive communications tool to our corprorate website may in fact be an exercise in futility, and it may follow the quick demise of many other ambitious well-meaning sites, periodicals, publications and blogs. But we felt that the developer's perspective - this developer's perspective in particular - may interest those who are affected by our developments.

By no means is this blog intended to be a discourse on enlightened urban development and architecture or for that matter a statistic-laden prognostication on the real estate market (if we really could predict the market, we wouldn't be working). There are many contributors on the web with far more knowledge and experience, and quite frankly more eloquent exposition than this humble development company (see some of our links). Rather, the intent of this blog is three-fold:

1. To provide a small window into a particular developer's perspective on such things as city planning, the politics of building, the real estate industry, architecture, community, home ownership and the number of other issues that affect or are affected by real estate development.

2. to create a forum for others to weigh-in.

3. to allow people to keep abreast of AGI's activities.

We hope to show that contrary to some widely accepted views, a real estate developer is not a capitalistic juggernaut destroying old neighborhoods and creating sprawl driven by its obsessive devotion to the almighty dollar. We will do our best to illustrate the role of the real estate developer, a necessary role in the evolution of the urban landscape as it responds to changing societal needs. By providing our views, one will be able to understand the economic risks inherent in being a developer and the reasons why certain decisions are made, the politics which affect real estate development, the dreams and realities of trying to literally build something new.

More than anything, a developer plays a deep role in a community, finding the perfect balance of serving the needs and desires of the community while being able to realize a profit commensurate with the risks of development so as not to need public assistance or subsidy. Through this blog we hope to reach across social, political and economic strata and solicit genuine responses, thoughts, opinions about what people want in their communities, what they see as needed for change and needed for preservation. Keeping our fingers on the pulse of local communities is critical to our success.

In the end, the nay-sayers may be right and in order not to offend any investors, lenders, communities and potential business partners, this blog will probably be forced to be far too cautious and prosaic to engender and maintain any public interest. Ironically, it may run the course of most real estate developments, battered by
the usual community groups, city planners, market analysts, financiers and consultants forcing a project into looking look like every other. Or there is a glimmer of hope that it may not, the true developer spirit is to always attempt the unattainable, even if it flies in the face of reason, please join us as we launch Keeping it Real.