The site of a closed auto dealership in Hallandale Beach has been sold by lender Ocean Bank for a 67 percent discount. The buyer paid just $875,000 for the site, which is located at 600 North Federal Highway. Ocean Bank won a foreclosure judgment last year on a $2.69 million mortgage. The buyer is managed by two Brooklyn residents, Mike and Shlomo Zion. [SFBJ]

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Vitran Homes at the Preserve, a home development in Cutler Bay, was spared foreclosure after it was sold for $3M to a Miami Lakes-based company. The company also assumed part of the mortgage from lender Ocean Bank, which filed the suit in 2009 concerning the 91 unsold lots and partially finished homes. In late February, the buyer, Roar Investments purchased the property at an average price of $32,967 per lot. [SFBJ]

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Dozens of contractors are caught in the balance in the dispute over the
half-completed Filling Station Lofts project at 1650 North Miami Court
in downtown Miami. Lawyers for the developer allege that it is simply a
case of a condo project falling into default, while the legal team
representing the group of construction companies thinks it’s a case of a
scheme to defraud. The contractors argue that a deal involving a
prominent Miami family that sent ownership of the project from Ocean
Group to a group of investors was less than wholesome. [Miami
Herald]

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A Delaware corporation called DREA Group 29 has acquired 128 units,
or nearly 130,000 square feet of salable space, in the Casa Bella condo
at 440 W. 16th Avenue in Hialeah for $7.5 million, according to a Condo
Vultures report based on Miami-Dade County records. The deal represented
a 54 percent discount, after the loan on the property valued the units
at approximately $126 per square foot. The seller was 4400 REPH, which
is controlled by Ocean Bank, which took ownership of the property last
month. TRD

Developer Peter Adrian has filed a lawsuit against longtime lender
Ocean Bank, alleging fraud and civil conspiracy. Adrian is seeking
damages in the amount of $58 million. Adran was developing three
properties in South Florida, including one in Doral, in Oct. 2008, when
Ocean Bank foreclosed. According to Adrian, he was working from Jan.
2008 to Sep. 2008 to negotiate extensions with the bank, including some
repayment offers, but the bank declined. The foreclosed properties
include Adrian at Pebble Walk in Doral, Indian River Park of Commerce
in Indian River County and Bahia Honda “Vero Village” in Vero Beach. [Miami Herald]

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Bernie Kosar, the former University of Miami and Miami Dolphins quarterback, is facing a $2 million foreclosure lawsuit on his Weston mansion at 2940 Paddock Road in Windmill Ranch Estates. Miami-based Ocean Bank sued after the football star’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy — brought on by several of his real estate developments were hit with with foreclosure suits in Spring 2008 — became a Chapter 7 liquidation. Kosar’s debt totals $18.9 million. His assets, including a minority ownership stake in the Florida Panthers, total $9.2 million. [SFBJ]

Lender Ocean Bank has prevailed in a $30.8 million foreclosure lawsuit over an undeveloped mixed-use project in Doral, filed in Miami-Dade Circuit Court. The Pebble Walk development at the intersection of Florida’s Turnpike and Northwest 41st Street, was supposed to result in 363 residential units and 125,000 square feet of commercial, retail and office space on a 17-acre site. Adrian Development cleared the land but construction never started. [SFBJ]

The developer of the partially-built Filling Station Lofts may have surrendered to foreclosure, but its Philadelphia-based lender, Versa Capital, must still contend with dozens of subcontractors who placed liens on the project before it can seize, and sell, the property.
The tale of a development caught in the jaws of Florida’s housing crisis is all too familiar, but a closer look at one such case demonstrates how the collapse of boom-era projects has spawned an immense web of litigation that will take many years and millions of dollars to resolve.
Filling Station Lofts, a 17-story condominium project in Miami’s Wynwood neighborhood, once had 77 units on the market for prices ranging from $300,000 to $2.7 million. It was promoted as being “bullet proof” from the specter of a real estate bust by an edgy advertising quoted in an Aug. 25, 2005 Wall Street Journal article. “If the builders and flippers ever looked deeper than their wallets they’d see what everyone else sees: an ocean of cookie-cutter ‘get rich quick’ schemes that deserve a tumble,” the ad read. “Forget them. We’re building our own magic city.” [more]

Two sites in Homestead and Boynton Beach will see new owners before they ever get a single house built, following foreclosures by lender Ocean Bank. The Miami lender will auction a 19-acre building site on the south side of Campbell Drive in Homestead on Dec. 2. It also foreclosed on a five-acre site owned by Miami-based Lyons Estates at Boynton Beach and guarantors Jose Paredes and Armando Rivero. A day after the foreclosures were announced, Ocean Bank also announced that it will lay off 78 of its own employees.

Lender Ocean Bank foreclosed on affiliates of Coral Gables-based BH
Capital Partners, Hialeah 150 and Villas Del Paraiso I, in a $16.8
million case. The 116 unsold units of the 151-unit development will be
auctioned February 12. This is one of four foreclosure actions against
affiliates of BH Capital. Ocean Bank repossessed its Crescent Cove
Condominiums in Coral Springs and has a pending foreclosure lawsuit
against its Villa Bellini Condos in Miami Lakes. Mercantil Commercebank
has a foreclosure case against BH Capital’s 2560 South Ocean condo in
Palm Beach. [more]