Second new Fort Lauderdale condo project completed

A second new condo project has been completed in the booming Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach market since this current South Florida real estate cycle began in 2011.

Transactions in the newly completed five-story Cymbrinas Cay project — developed by Cardinal Southern Equities LLC with David and Gail Gilman of Lauderdale-By-The-Sea — in the Las Olas Isles neighborhood of Fort Lauderdale began to be recorded on July 13, according to Broward County records.

To date, deeds have been recorded for three of the eight units in the boutique project, for total sales of nearly $2.6 million, for an average of more than $450 per square foot in the project located in the 100 block of Isle Of Venice Drive, according to government records.

None of the new Cymbrinas Cay condo units are currently on the resale or rental market as of Monday, according to the Southeast Florida MLXchange.

The Cymbrinas Cay project is one of 10 new condo buildings with more than 100 units announced for the Las Olas Isles neighborhood located between the Downtown Fort Lauderdale mainland and the barrier island beaches as of Monday, according to the preconstruction condo projects website CraneSpotters.com. (For disclosure, my firm operates the website.)

In the Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach market, developers have announced plans to construct at least 44 new condo buildings with nearly 3,400 units in an area that stretches from Oakland Park Boulevard south to State Road 84, and the Atlantic Ocean west to Northwest Seventh/Southwest Fourth Avenue as of Monday, according to the data.

By comparison, a year ago developers had announced 15 new condo building with less than 800 units for the Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach market for the week of July 21, 2014.

Despite the sudden surge in new condo projects, the resale condo market in the Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach area appears to be performing well at this point.

In the first six months of this year, buyers acquired nearly 590 resale units at an average price of $302 per square foot, compared to a year earlier when less than 565 resale condos transacted at an average price of $283 per square foot between January and June of 2014 in the Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach market, according to statistics from the Southeast Florida MLXchange.

At the current resale transaction pace, the Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach market has less than 6.5 months of condo units on the resale market available for purchase as of Monday.

A balanced market is considered to have about six months of resale units available for purchase. More months of condo resale supply suggests a buyer’s market, and less months indicates a seller’s market.

In Fort Lauderdale’s preconstruction condo market, the Cymbrinas Cay is the second project to be completed in this cycle since the five-story Adagio on the Bay project with 12 units began recording deed transactions in April.

An additional nine buildings with less than 275 units are currently under construction in the Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach market.

More than 30 new condo buildings with nearly 3,100 units are currently in the planning and presale phase of development for the area, according to the data.

Overall, South Florida developers have now completed 35 new condo towers with nearly 3,250 units — including the Cymbrinas Cay project — located east of I-95 in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach as of Monday, according to CraneSpotters.com.

The new South Florida condos completed to date represent nearly 8 percent of the more than 43,000 units announced for the tri-county region during this cycle.

At least 110 new condo buildings with more than 10,850 units — more than 25 percent of the overall South Florida total — are currently under construction.

An additional 214 new condo buildings with nearly 29,000 units — some 67 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.

The unanswered question going forward is whether the Downtown Fort Lauderdale and Beach market boom is a result of more domestic buyers purchasing new condo units with strong U.S. dollars or international investors with weak foreign currencies looking in other parts of South Florida for cheaper alternatives to the increasingly pricey Miami-Dade County preconstruction market.  

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.