I don’t mean to be too alarmist — chances are, no landlord would be dumb enough to dump a beloved landmark like Cancun — but this news is a bit alarming. Eater SF reports:
Taqueria Cancun may be in danger of disappearing. Co-owner Gerardo Rico says that Cancun’s flagship 19th and Mission location has been without a lease for more than a year after the death of their longtime landlord, and is currently going month-to-month until the landlord’s family decides what to do with the space. Asked what would happen to Cancun, he responded, “Who knows?” [link]
“chances are, no landlord would be dumb enough to dump a beloved landmark like Cancun” ha ha ha. Yea right.
Cancun has made so much money over the years. It’s surprising they haven’t bought a building to protect themselves from eviction or rent increases.
maybe it hasn’t been for sale.
Eek! Home of the best burritos in SF (and, therefore, anywhere), no less.
too many customers?
charge more.
but that would price out some of the locals …
okay, just charge white people more.
i’m actually not kidding.
White natives should have to pay double.
Non white natives should move to Vallego and take BART in when they want to eat here.
I believe this would be illegal under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title II.
Chris: I’m a little surprised too, but remember that it’s not just a matter of buying the building (easily a 7-figure deal even in the less-gentrified parts of the mission): you either have to buy an already-existing restaurant (and even then you would probably have to substantially renovate it) or worse yet a space that isn’t zoned for food service yet and go through the nightmare of trying to get the permits to convert.
And even if you get a good deal on a building, don’t go bankrupt setting up the kitchen, and the stars align to get you your permits before you run out of capital, you could still easily end up in a protracted street fight with your neighbors.
In short, it’s hard to blame any restaurant owner for staying put in a space that’s working for them.
La Taqueria, La Cumbre are 2 examples of popular taquerias that had foresight to buy their buildings. They are here to stay.
Hopefully we’ll be spared the “evil” landlord discussion should Cancun lose their lease.
That’s a funny pair. La Taqueria has stayed awesome, maybe even gotten awesomer over the years. So you’d say that owning the building has freed them to focus on making good carne asada.
La Cumbre has really gone to shit — it used to be really good 20 years ago. Now it’s all meat dried out and not tasty, poorly steamed tortillas, and the staff doesn’t appear to give a crap. So maybe owning the building has freed the owners to sit home running the numbers on their exhilarating property appreciation while the business becomes no sabroso.
Foresight. Maybe. Did you know that buying property often requires loans? Did you know that Banks are often unwilling to give these loans to brown people? So if they couldn’t raise the capital from friends/family to buy the buildings(if it were even an option)then they may not have really had the choice and have to stay on a lease. It’s not like they clear more than 8-12%.
Well, at least we will have that time when a recent transplant from the east coast got all bro style in Cancun. Of course this was when he was still a tech guy. Now he rides a fixie, dresses like a hipster, and hates on techies. I think you call that a hypocrite. Yes, Kevin Montgomery from Uptown Almanac did things that would make the marina bro’s he goes all nimby on cringe. EXHIBIT A: this is the face of gentrification San Francisco.
Gringo’s do Cancun
that’s a pretty funny piece
Wow thank you. Forgot about that post. Timeless. Very special people. With so much to offer. And he rattles the base now. Haha. But I digress I remember reading that post and knew this city was fucked.
the horror
Allan took the pics. Ban all mission bloggers except the asian one and Ariel.
Minus one (million) for “the asian one” and/or not writing “the jewish one”, too. ‘Cause obvious half-assed assholes be obvious.