Type 48 · License only
SF-3001
$260,000
View SF-3001
San Francisco County · Type 48 · On-Sale General, Public Premises
San Francisco Type 48 Liquor License For Sale
One Type 48 license on our San Francisco book, asking $260,000, the license only, on a page of its own.
1Type 48 license on the book
$260,000Asking price
AvailableStatus
34 daysOn market
The book
The Type 48 license available in San Francisco
One license, priced, with the day it came to market. We publish the city and stop there, not the neighborhood, because on a one-deep class the neighborhood would name the seller outright.
The entry below is one license at its own address, so you can open it, link to it or send it on. It is the license alone, no premises, no lease, no fixtures, no sound system, no goodwill, no stock.
1 Type 48 license · asking $260,000 · 1 available · on the market 34 days.
Asking prices, availability and days on market are reviewed weekly and were last checked on 13 September 2026. Go to the inquiry form to tell the desk what you are opening.
The privilege
What a Type 48 lets you do, and what it does not
| Class | Type 48, On-Sale General, Public Premises |
|---|---|
| In plain English | A bar or nightclub. The full range of drinks for consumption on the premises, with no requirement to feed anyone. |
| Food obligation | None. This is the whole reason the class exists and the reason drinks-led rooms want it. |
| Minors | Persons under 21 may not enter and remain. This is a hard rule, not a door policy, and it rules out families, all-ages events and most daytime trade. |
| Hours | California permits sale from 6:00 a.m. to 2:00 a.m. A San Francisco Type 48 often sits alongside an Entertainment Commission permit if the room puts on live music or extended-hours events, a separate application on a separate calendar. |
| Quota status | Quota class. San Francisco is over the county ceiling for on-sale general licenses, so no new original issues. |
| Moving it to another address | A premises-to-premises transfer inside San Francisco County is possible with ABC approval and a fresh 30-day posting, and a drinks-led use attracts local attention. Moving a quota license out of the county is generally not available. |
| Local approval | Separate from ABC, and on this class usually the longer half. A conditional use may be required in your Neighborhood Commercial District, the Police Department’s alcohol liaison reviews the application, and an entertainment use is its own permit again. |
| Included in the price | The license. No premises, no lease, no fixtures, no sound system, no goodwill, no stock. |
| Offer handling | Offers reviewed as received. With one on the book we will tell you plainly if another party is ahead of you, and we will not manufacture one. |
This table summarizes the class from the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control’s own definitions and from how San Francisco files actually run. It is a summary, not a quotation, and it is not legal advice, conditions on an individual license override the general picture, and you will see those on qualification.
The room
What a Type 48 room looks like in San Francisco
A license is an abstraction until you picture the room. A San Francisco Type 48 is a bar first and everything else second, no kitchen to build, and a door that is closed to anyone under 21.
Type 48
The back bar
Type 48
The counter and the booths
Seeing a specific room happens after qualification and the mutual NDA, in person and with the seller’s consent. Until then the page carries the county, the class, the price and the dates, which is everything you need to decide whether to inquire.
The band
What a San Francisco Type 48 costs
There is one Type 48 on the San Francisco book and it asks $260,000. With a single license there is no band to quote, so here is the honest frame instead: that price sits just above the $232,500 median for a Type 47, and the reason is supply rather than privilege.
A Type 48 is not worth more than a Type 47 because it does more. It does less: same drinks, no kitchen obligation, and a door closed to anyone under 21. It prices where it does because one or two trade here in a year while eighteen Type 47s sit on this book at once.
What would move this price. The same three things that move any on-sale license in this city, the condition of the register file, the petition conditions attached to the license, and whether the seller is under time pressure. Which of the three is doing the work on any given licence is something the released file answers.
What we will not do is manufacture competition for it. There is no countdown on this page, no bid ticker and no watcher count. If another party is ahead of you we will say so, and if nobody is, we will say that too.
Read off our own current San Francisco book on 13 September 2026 and restated whenever the book changes.
Beyond the price
What completing actually costs
The asking price is not the cost of the deal. Here is the rest of it, itemized against the $260,000 asking price.
Three columns. On a narrow screen the table scrolls sideways inside its own box, the page does not.
| Item | Paid to | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Escrow fee | Licensed escrow holder, as Bus. & Prof. Code §24074 requires | $1,450 |
| ABC person-to-person transfer fee | California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control | $1,250 |
| Notice of intended transfer, published | Newspaper of general circulation in San Francisco | $385 |
| Live Scan and fingerprinting, two principals | California Department of Justice, via ABC | $160 |
| Buyer’s counsel, ABC transfer work | Your attorney | $4,800 |
| Costs to close | Excluding the license price | $8,045 |
| This license plus costs to close | $260,000 + $8,045 | $268,045 |
The whole price goes into escrow, not a deposit. This is the part that surprises buyers coming from other states. California requires the full consideration for a license transfer to be placed with a licensed escrow holder before the transfer is approved, and it is released to the seller only on issue. There is no 10% and no balance on completion.
Conditional use, where San Francisco requires it. A change of license or a new alcohol use in many of the city’s Neighborhood Commercial Districts needs Conditional Use Authorization from the Planning Commission before ABC will act. Budget $3,000 to $8,000 and three to five months for that track, and treat it as separate from the figures above. It is the single largest source of San Francisco timetable slippage.
After you hold it: the ABC annual renewal on a San Francisco on-sale general license runs about $1,400, and about $700 on an off-sale.
Our commission: our fee, quoted in writing before we start, paid by the seller at closing. There is no buyer-side fee, no registration fee and no charge for the confidential file once you are qualified.
Financing: a license is not mortgageable the way real property is, and most California lenders will not lend against one alone. We work with two lenders who underwrite license transfers as part of a wider fit-out facility and will make an introduction.
Fee amounts are our current working figures for a San Francisco file and were last checked on 13 September 2026. The escrow requirement, the conditional-use track and the renewal bands are described from practice rather than quoted from a fee schedule, confirm the current ABC fee schedule and your Planning district before you sign anything.
The timetable
Transferring a Type 48 in San Francisco
Six stages from an accepted offer to a license in your name. Thirty of those days are a statutory posting that nobody can shorten.
1
Offer accepted, escrow opened
7 days. A purchase agreement, then escrow with a licensed escrow holder. California requires the full consideration to sit in escrow before the Department will approve the transfer, so this is the point your money moves, not completion day.
2
Buyer qualification and application
10 days. The person-to-person transfer application, Live Scan fingerprinting for every principal, and proof of funds. This is also when the mutual NDA is signed and the confidential file, license number, licensee of record, premises address, term, encumbrances, tax position, is released to you.
3
Public notice posted at the premises
30 days. ABC posts the application at the premises for 30 days, and the notice of intended transfer is published in a newspaper of general circulation. The 30 days are statutory and cannot be shortened, whatever anyone promises you.
4
Protest period and local agency review
14 days. Any protest filed during the posting is worked through here, and this is where San Francisco can add time: the Police Department’s alcohol liaison reviews on-sale applications, and a Planning conditional use, if your district needs one, runs on its own much longer calendar.
5
ABC investigation and approval
10 days. The investigator confirms the premises, the qualification of the buyer and the tax position of the seller. Clean files clear here without anyone hearing from anyone.
6
Escrow closes, license issued in your name
7 days. Approval issued, escrow released to the seller, license recorded against you. You can trade.
Stage day counts are the medians from our own closed California files and add to . The 30-day posting is a statutory period; the rest is how San Francisco files actually run.
Released when you qualify
The license number and the address are not on this page
Not masked, not blurred, not shown in part. They are simply not published, for any license, anywhere on this site. A seller is almost always still trading. In a city where a neighborhood and a license class narrow a business to a handful of doors, publishing either one tells their staff, their landlord and the operator across the street that they are selling. So the shop window carries everything you need to shortlist, and nothing that identifies the seller.
Published on every listing
- County and city
- License class and what it permits
- Whether the class is under the county quota
- Asking price and availability
- Date listed and days on market
- Cost to close and the transfer timetable
Released after qualification and NDA
- License number and licensee of record
- Premises address and trading name
- Register standing and license term
- Conditions, encumbrances and lien position
- Seller tax clearance position
- Local approval history and any protest record
How the release works. Qualification is two things: proof of funds, and the personal information every principal has to give ABC anyway. Sign a mutual non-disclosure agreement and the complete file is released to you within one business day. There is no fee for it. Four further San Francisco licenses are held entirely off-market at the seller’s request and are only ever shown this way, they are not among the 30 on the book. Qualification starts at the inquiry form.
Type 48 · San Francisco
Tell the desk what you are opening
Seven fields. We reply inside one business day, from a named person, with the next step and nothing else. No newsletter, no drip sequence, no call center.
Tell us the venue and we will tell you the license, rather than the other way round, and whether the sensible route is to buy one on the book or to apply for a new one. We handle whichever it is.
Prefer to talk? The direct line is (800) 799-9081, or write to mike@liquorlicenseagents.com.
Inquiring commits you to nothing, and there is no buyer-side fee.
The other side of the desk
Selling a San Francisco Type 48
What we need to list it. The license number, the licensee of record and the premises address, so we can read the register entry, the conditions and the term before we price anything. None of that is published. What goes on the page is the county, the class, the asking price, the date and the status, the fields you can see on every entry above, and nothing else.
What it costs you. our fee, quoted in writing before we start, paid at closing out of escrow. Nothing up front, nothing if it does not sell, no listing fee and no renewal. You pay your own counsel and the escrow holder.
How long it takes. Two clocks. Finding a qualified buyer is the one that varies, the one Type 48 license on our book has been listed 34 days. Once an offer is accepted the 78-day transfer timetable applies to you exactly as it applies to the buyer, and 30 of those days are a statutory posting nobody can shorten.
What stays confidential until a buyer qualifies. Everything that identifies you. Your staff, your landlord, your suppliers and the operator across the street learn nothing from this page. A buyer sees the identifying file only after proof of funds and a signed mutual NDA, and you see who they are at the same moment they see who you are.
Questions
Type 48 questions we are actually asked
Can under-21s ever come into a Type 48 premises?
Not to enter and remain. This is the defining limit of the class and it is a rule, not a door policy: no accompanied minors, no all-ages shows, no children with a parent at four in the afternoon. If any part of your concept needs people under 21 in the room, food service, daytime trade, all-ages music, the license you want is a Type 47 with a real kitchen, not a Type 48.
What is the difference between a Type 48 and a Type 47?
Same drinks, different obligations. A Type 47 must operate as a bona fide eating place with a working kitchen, and minors are permitted. A Type 48 has no food obligation at all, and nobody under 21 may enter and remain. Neither is an upgrade of the other. Pick on the room you intend to run.
Do I need an entertainment permit as well?
If the room puts on live music, DJs or extended-hours events, yes, that is a San Francisco Entertainment Commission permit, and it is a separate application on a separate calendar from the ABC transfer and from any Planning conditional use. Three approvals, three clocks. Start the entertainment one early; it is the one most often forgotten until the room is built.
Why is there only one on the book?
Because that is what the San Francisco market for this class looks like. Type 48s here tend to sit in long-established rooms and change hands with the business rather than on their own. If a Type 48 is what your concept needs, tell us now rather than watching this page, we work the off-market book and the operators we know, and that is how this class usually moves.
Can I convert a Type 48 into a Type 47 later?
Not by converting the license. You would be buying a Type 47 on the open market at whatever it costs then, and dealing separately with what happens to the Type 48 you hold. Deciding between them now, before either is bought, is enormously cheaper than deciding later.
Activity, honestly
Dates, yes. Counters, no.
The Type 48 above carries the day it came to market and how long it has sat there, 34 days. That is a fact we can stand behind. What you will not find anywhere on this site:
- No view count. A view count is trivially inflated and proves nothing about demand.
- No watcher count and no “3 people are looking at this right now”.
- No bid ticker, no auction clock, no countdown. Offers are reviewed as they arrive.
- No manufactured scarcity. The county quota supplies all the scarcity this market needs.
We would rather publish the one activity signal that is checkable, the day a license came to our book, and how long it has sat there, and nothing we cannot stand behind.
Who you are dealing with
The desk handling this transfer
Broker
Liquor License Agents
Files closed
California transfers
Escrow held by
A licensed escrow holder
ABC counsel
San Francisco ABC counsel
The other classes
If this is not the right license
Six classes have a page here. Four hold resale stock and two hold none, which changes the route rather than the answer. The wrong class is an expensive mistake to unwind, so here are the others.
On the book now
Type 47
On-Sale General, Eating Place
A full bar inside a restaurant. The deepest class in San Francisco and the one most buyers mean when they say “a liquor license”.
- 18 on the San Francisco book
- Median ask $232,500
Type 21
Off-Sale General
A liquor store license: beer, wine and spirits sold sealed, to be drunk somewhere else. Quota-limited, and the widest price spread of any San Francisco class.
- 10 on the San Francisco book
- Median ask $175,000
Type 20
Off-Sale Beer and Wine
Beer and wine sold sealed, to take away. the lowest ask on this site, which changes the advice completely.
- 1 on the San Francisco book
- Asking $15,000
No resale stock, reached by applying
Type 41
On-Sale Beer and Wine, Eating Place
On-sale beer and wine for a bona fide eating place. Nothing on the resale book right now, and the route to one is an application we run for you.
- Nothing on the resale book right now
- Reached by applying, with us
Type 40
On-Sale Beer
On-sale beer. Nothing on the resale book right now, and the route to one is an application we run for you.
- Nothing on the resale book right now
- Reached by applying, with us
Type 41 (On-Sale Beer and Wine, Eating Place) and Type 40 (On-Sale Beer) each have a page of their own. Neither has resale stock on our San Francisco book right now, and both pages set out the application route instead.