Melo launches pre-sales for new Miami condo

South American residential development company the Melo Group is forging ahead with its planned 23 Biscayne Bay condominium tower, and pre-construction sales have already launched, consultant and Condo Vultures principal Peter Zalewski wrote in the Miami Herald today. The company, founded by Jose Luis Melo and his sons, Carlos and Martin, has already built several other housing projects in the area, including One Plaza at 1800 SW 1st Avenue and 1800 Biscayne Plaza at 275 NE 18th Street, but this one is particularly risky because it is launching at a time when there are already more than 3,200 new, unsold condo units in the Greater Downtown Miami area, Zaleski noted. And that figure doesn’t include the new condo units that have been scooped up by bulk buyers and are already back on the resale market. Perhaps that’s why prices are set to begin at around $230 per square foot, far below the $348 per square foot average sales price developers in the region pulled in during the first quarter of 2011. The 96-unit tower will be self-funded and is slated to break ground as soon as next month. The developers expect to finish the building, which will also contain 3,100 square feet of office space, by the third quarter of 2012. [Miami Herald]