Oakland’s massive Kaiser Permanente tower has been sold to a luxury apartment developer in San Ramon. The office building and adjacent parking lot at 1950 Franklin Street near Lake Merritt have been sold to Bering, Kaiser confirmed in a statement to SFGATE. The property sold for $14.35 million, according to Alameda County Assessor’s Office records reviewed by the San Francisco Business Times.
The building has been largely unoccupied since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to insurance giant Bering Co. Bering did not respond to SFGATE’s request for comment about the building’s future, but developers recently built a 394-foot-tall luxury apartment tower nearby at 1900 Broadway.
On Aug. 14, Kaiser sold another Oakland building, at 2000 Broadway, to BART for $25.5 million. BART spokesman Christopher Filippi told SFGATE that the building “will be the future home of the BART Police Department.”
The sales of both companies come at a time when Kaiser is consolidating its offices, saying it doesn’t need as much space as employees have become accustomed to remote and hybrid work. Last year, the company announced plans to move about 1,200 Oakland employees, or 10% of its workforce, to Pleasanton between 2024 and 2025 to cut costs. Kaiser did not respond to SFGATE’s questions about the status of the relocation.
The company also made headlines in December when it issued a memo encouraging employees to eat lunch inside its restaurants, citing a high rate of crime in Oakland, particularly robberies. And amid growing concerns about crime in downtown Oakland, Kaiser partnered with other Oakland employers, including Blue Shield, Clorox and PG&E, to develop a $10 million security plan for employees.
Kaiser said in a statement that despite the sale of the building, its headquarters will remain in the city at 1 Kaiser Plaza, and the sale does not affect Kaiser’s hospital, Oakland Medical Center, at 3600 Broadway.
