As someone who goes to SF for a lot of conferences, hotels are pretty outrageous as well. Depends on the relative areas, but they're probably worse than Manhattan as well. Depends on demand during a given week, but hotels are pretty easily $300/night with taxes.
I haven't paid less than $200/night for years in SF. At the last VMworld, $400/night with taxes was a bargain. It certainly depends on the week and the location, but anecdotally (and I travel to both locations quite frequently), SF in the general Moscone area is every bit as expensive as midtown Manhattan.
Well yes, but of course "hotel close to a premier convention center, where most hotel bills are going to be paid by corporate, not individual" are going to be noticeably higher.
Yes, but those sort of rates extend to the Union Square and Ferry Building areas and I don't observe, say, Fisherman's Wharf necessarily being a lot cheaper. (And there's very little in the Mission and Dogpatch areas when I've gone to events at the campus down that way.) During a big conference even the hotels down by the airport can be over $300/night.
(I'm sure there are cheaper options especially once you get well away from the tourist, downtown, and convention center areas. Though I imagine that's true of Manhattan as well. But SF has gotten quite expensive in general.)
The Zelos used to be the Palomar, which at least used to be a pretty good deal for that area though I don't think I've personally stayed there. $115 is a very good price for a business hotel in the Union Square area. I imagine immediately after New Years may be relatively light on business travelers.
