Glen Park “Fortress” Sets Record With Tech Investor Sale

A tech investor who decamped for Miami during the pandemic has set a new record for a home sale in San Francisco’s Glen Park neighborhood — even though it closed at about $10 million less than his initial asking price.

Ben Ling, founder of early stage tech-focused Bling Capital and a former executive at Facebook, YouTube and Google, put the 9,700-square-foot estate he built at 21 Everson Street on the market for $22 million in 2023. A price cut to $17.5 million came in February and the home sold for just under $12.5 million on Tuesday, or about $1,300 per square foot, according to several listings sites.

The buyer was 1plus2plus3plus4plus5plus6, LLC, according to a source familiar with the sale. The LLC, whose numbers add up to 21, was filed with the state on May 15 and the filing lists Paul M. LaMartina as the manager. LaMartina is an estate planning attorney with Jeffer Mangels Butler and Mitchell in San Francisco and has “a strong background working with nontraditional families and high net worth individuals,” according to the firm’s website.

Frank Nolan of Vanguard had the listing and represented the buyers as well, but declined to comment on the sale. Nolan told the Business Times in 2023 that the biggest Glen Park sale until that point was $10 million. It appears that no home has broken that record in the last two years.

The only sale that has even come close belongs to Ling’s neighbor, “Paypal Mafia” member Keith Rabois, who sold his home at 2 Everson for $8.7 million in 2023 to former Obama campaign manager Jim Messina, according to property records and loan documents. Rabois is also the managing director at Khosla Ventures, where Ling was a general partner from 2013 to 2018. Ling backed Lyft and Instacart, among other start-up successes, during that time.

It’s rare to see a home listed, much less sell for, eight digits in San Francisco outside of its prestigious northern neighborhoods. District 7, which includes Pacific and Presidio Heights, as well as the Marina, had 14 of the 17 $10 million-plus sales in the city reported to the San Francisco Multiple Listing Service from mid-April 2024 to mid-April 2025, according to Compass data. In District 5, which includes Glen Park as well as Noe, Eureka and Cole valleys, there were only three sales above $7 million during that time and none broke the $10 million mark.

The median sale price in Glen Park during that April-to-April period was $1.9 million, according to Compass, and a $6.2 million sale was the biggest in the neighborhood during that time. The median-sized home in Glen Park is also only about 1,700 square feet, compared to over 4,000 square feet in Pacific Heights and 5,500 in Presidio Heights, which helps explain why it took an unusually large home for the neighborhood to set a new record.

It is a “modern, architecturally significant fortress,” according to Nolan’s marketing materials. The home is decked out with a home theater with Sony 4K projectors, Dolby surround sound and seating for 22; reverse osmosis drinking water; and a 60-foot-wide main floor with floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors that lead out to a panoramic view deck.

Ling bought 21 Everson for $1.9 million in 2013, according to county records, and spent about three years building out the property with a nice view, six ensuite bedrooms, nine total bathrooms, and a two-car garage.

The project wrapped up in 2019, according to permitting records. But Ling and his partner Christopher Coudron, the co-founder and CTO of cryptocurrency liquidity company Hedge Labs, didn’t end up staying in their new custom home for long. Instead they bought a nearly $30 million Miami Beach mansion in September 2021. There, the couple once again has Rabois as a neighbor; he also bought a Miami Beach property for just under $29 million in December 2020.