San Francisco sues developers over sinking tower
San Francisco on Thursday filed a lawsuit against the developers of a sinking and tilting luxury high-rise, claiming they knew about the problems but did not disclose the information to potential home buyers as required by law.
Millennium Tower was completed about eight years ago and so far has sunk 16 inches into the soft soil and landfill of the city’s crowded Financial District. The sinking has been uneven, creating a 2-inch tilt at the base and a roughly 6-inch lean at the top.
City Attorney Dennis Herrera filed the suit against Mission Street Developers LLC as a cross-complaint of a previous lawsuit filed by homeowners against the Transbay Joint Powers Authority. The authority is building the new Transbay Transit Center next door.
“We are not going to sit by and allow a developer— or anyone else — to enrich themselves at the expense of others by hiding crucial information that they’re required by law to disclose,” Herrera said at a news conference Thursday. “That gave the developer an unfair advantage against competitors, and it cheated homebuyers out of information they needed to make an informed decision.”