Related completes fifth new condo tower this cycle

The Related Group — South Florida’s most prolific vertical residential developer — has completed its fifth new condo tower since the current real estate cycle began, with nearly a combined 1,100 units located east of I-95 in the tri-county South Florida region.

The first transaction in the newly opened Baltus House project — officially named the 4250 Biscayne Boulevard Condominium — with 167 units just north of Greater Downtown Miami was recorded at a price of nearly $205,000, or $434 per square foot, on June 30, according to Miami-Dade County records.

In less than a week, the Baltus House project has recorded transactions for eight units totaling nearly $2.3 million, for an average price of $465 per square foot, in a project that first began construction in March 2013, according to government records.

As of Monday, four units in the Baltus House are listed on the resale market at an average asking price of $381 per square foot. An additional unit in the project is listed on the rental market at an average monthly asking price of $3.01 per square foot, according to data from the Southeast Florida MLXchange.

Prior to finishing the Baltus House project, the Related Group completed the 24-story Apogee Beach project with 49 units in Hollywood in 2013; the 28-story MyBrickell project with 192 units in Greater Downtown Miami in 2014; the 43-story 1100 Millecento Residences project with 382 units in Greater Downtown Miami in February; and the 33-story Beachwalk project with 300 units in Hallandale Beach in March.

Overall, South Florida developers have now completed 33 new condo towers with more than 2,900 units east of I-95 in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach as of Monday, according to the preconstruction condo projects website CraneSpotters.com. (For disclosure, my firm operates the website.)

The new South Florida condos completed to date represent nearly 7 percent of the more than 43,000 units announced for the tri-county region during this cycle.

More than 110 new condo towers with nearly 11,100 units — more than 25 percent of the overall South Florida total — are currently under construction.

An additional 214 new condo buildings with more than 29,000 units — some 68 percent of the overall total announced this cycle — are currently in the planning or presale phase of development in South Florida, according to the data.

For its part, the Related Group has a dozen new condo buildings with more than 3,000 units currently under construction east of I-95 in South Florida.

At least three of Related’s new projects — the ICON Bay in Greater Downtown Miami, the Marea South Beach and the One Ocean in Miami Beach — are slated to be completed in the upcoming weeks and months.

Besides the projects now being built, Related has an additional 22 new condo towers with more than 4,500 units in the planning or presale phase east of I-95 in South Florida, according to the data.

It is worth noting that Related accounts for more than 20 percent of all new South Florida condos announced since 2011.

The unanswered question going forward is whether Related will attempt to build all of the new South Florida condo units as originally announced, given growing signs of a slowdown in preconstruction sales due in part to rising presale prices, a strengthening U.S. dollar and a weakening global economy.   

Peter Zalewski is a real estate columnist for The Real Deal who founded Condo Vultures LLC, a consultancy and publishing company, as well as Condo Vultures Realty LLC and CVR Realty brokerages and the Condo Ratings Agency, an analytics firm. The Condo Ratings Agency operates CraneSpotters.com, a preconstruction condo projects website, in conjunction with the Miami Association of Realtors.