The 10 Cheapest San Francisco, CA Neighborhoods To Live In For 2024


The cheapest San Francisco neighborhoods are Potrero Hill and South Of Market for 2024 based on Saturday Night Science.

Worst Neighborhoods In San Francisco
Source: Wikipedia User Bernard Gagnon | GFDL

Everything else equal, we can all agree that living in a cheaper place is better than living in a more expensive place.

I’d much rather pay $500/mo in rent than $1,000. And I’d rather pay $2 for coffee than $5.

And while every neighbhorhood in San Francisco might be more expensive than living in rural California, there are certain neighborhoods that are definitely cheaper.

What exactly are those San Francisco neighborhoods where your dollar goes a little further — you can get that one bedroom instead of the studio?

Instead of relying on public opinion and speculation, we wanted to get the facts straight and determine which neighborhoods in San Francisco are the cheapest using Saturday Night Science.

The Cheapest Neighborhoods In San Francisco For 2024

  1. Potrero Hill
  2. South Of Market
  3. Outer Mission
  4. West Of Twin Peaks
  5. Glen Park
  6. Bayview
  7. Bernal Heights
  8. Castro-Upper Market
  9. Mission
  10. Financial District

What’s the cheapest neighborhood to live in San Francisco for 2024? According to the most recent census data, Potrero Hill looks to be the cheapest San Francisco neighborhood to live in.

At this point, we should make it clear that you do get what you pay for — some of these neighborhoods might not be the best places to live in San Francisco. You could be sacrificing location or crime rates for more space and cheaper groceries.

Read on to see how we determined the places around San Francisco that deserve a little bragging rights, or maybe you’re interested in the worst neighborhoods in San Francisco.

For more California reading, check out:


Table Of Contents: Top Ten | Methodology | Summary | Table


The 10 Cheapest Neighborhoods To Live In San Francisco For 2024

Potrero Hill San Francisco, CA

Source: Wikipedia User | GFDL
Overall SnackAbility

9.5
/10

Population: 11,617
Cost Of Living Index: 209 (18th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 6.8 (cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.014 (5th cheapest)
More on Potrero Hill: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

10
/10

Population: 28,489
Cost Of Living Index: 165 (4th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 7.8 (4th cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.017 (19th cheapest)
More on South Of Market: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

10
/10

Population: 11,675
Cost Of Living Index: 185 (10th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 8.6 (9th cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.015 (11th cheapest)
More on Outer Mission: Data | Real Estate

West Of Twin Peaks San Francisco, CA

Source: Flickr User Allan Ferguson | CC BY 2.0
Overall SnackAbility

10
/10

Population: 21,375
Cost Of Living Index: 233 (27th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 7.1 (3rd cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.012 (cheapest)
More on West Of Twin Peaks: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

10
/10

Population: 9,165
Cost Of Living Index: 225 (24th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 8.3 (5th cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.014 (4th cheapest)
More on Glen Park: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

8.5
/10

Population: 22,475
Cost Of Living Index: 165 (4th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 8.9 (14th cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.016 (16th cheapest)
More on Bayview: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

10
/10

Population: 27,627
Cost Of Living Index: 205 (16th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 8.6 (10th cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.015 (9th cheapest)
More on Bernal Heights: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

10
/10

Population: 21,884
Cost Of Living Index: 229 (25th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 8.4 (6th cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.014 (7th cheapest)
More on Castro-Upper Market: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

10
/10

Population: 59,096
Cost Of Living Index: 203 (15th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 8.8 (13th cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.015 (12th cheapest)
More on Mission: Data | Real Estate

Overall SnackAbility

9.5
/10

Population: 3,915
Cost Of Living Index: 180 (8th cheapest)
Home Value To Income Ratio: 15.0 (32nd cheapest)
Rent To Income Ratio: 0.013 (2nd cheapest)
More on Financial District: Data | Real Estate

Methodology: How We Determined The Cheapest San Francisco Hoods In 2024

To rank the cheapest places to live in San Francisco, we had to determine what criteria define “cheap” and then apply Saturday Night Science.

Using Census and extrapolated BLS data, we arrived at the following set of criteria:

  • Overall Cost Of Living
  • Rent To Income Ratio
  • Median Home Value To Income Ratio

We then ranked each neighborhood with scores from 1 to 34 in each category, where 1 was the cheapest.

Next, we averaged the rankings for each neighborhood to create a cheap neighborhood index.

And finally, we crowned the neighborhood with the lowest cheapest neighborhood index, the “Cheapest City Neighborhood In San Francisco.” We’re lookin’ at you, Potrero Hill.

We updated this article for 2024. This is our fourth time ranking the cheapest neighborhoods to live in San Francisco. Skip to the end to see the list of all the neighborhoods in the city, from cheapest to most expensive.

Summary: Lowest Cost Places To Live In San Francisco

If you’re measuring the neighborhoods in San Francisco where prices are low, and it’s cheap to live, this is an accurate list.

The most affordable neighborhoods in San Francisco are Potrero Hill, South Of Market, Outer Mission, West Of Twin Peaks, Glen Park, Bayview, Bernal Heights, Castro-Upper Market, Mission, and Financial District.

As mentioned earlier, the neighborhoods in San Francisco aren’t all cheap. North Beach takes the title of the most expensive neighborhood to live in San Francisco.

The most expensive neighborhoods in San Francisco are North Beach, Outer Richmond, Lakeshore, Chinatown, and Nob Hill.

We ranked the neighborhoods from cheapest to most expensive in the chart below.

For more California reading, check out:

Detailed List Of The Cheapest Neighborhoods To Live In San Francisco For 2024

Rank Neighborhood Cost Of Living Index
1 Potrero Hill 209
2 South Of Market 165
3 Outer Mission 185
4 West Of Twin Peaks 233
5 Glen Park 225
6 Bayview 165
7 Bernal Heights 205
8 Castro-Upper Market 229
9 Mission 203
10 Financial District 180
11 Diamond Heights 217
12 Ocean View 181
13 Outer Sunset 200
14 Noe Valley 248
15 Russian Hill 225
16 Crocker Amazon 174
17 Twin Peaks 231
18 Excelsior 178
19 Visitacion Valley 162
20 Seacliff 262
21 Pacific Heights 287
22 Downtown 132
23 Haight-Ashbury 250
24 Marina 276
25 Parkside 201
26 Western Addition 196
27 Presidio Heights 281
28 Inner Sunset 221
29 Inner Richmond 245
30 Nob Hill 208
31 Chinatown 161
32 Lakeshore 188
33 Outer Richmond 223
34 North Beach 212
About Chris Kolmar

Chris Kolmar has been in the real estate business for almost ten years now. He originally worked for Movoto Real Estate as the director of marketing before founding HomeSnacks.

He believes the key to finding the right place to live comes down to looking at the data, reading about things to do, and, most importantly, checking it out yourself before you move.

If you've been looking for a place to live in the past several years, you've probably stumbled upon his writing already.

You can find out more about him on LinkedIn or his website.