The residential construction boom in Miami-Dade County has moved up the coast to such Broward County communities as Hallandale Beach, Hollywood and Fort Lauderdale, which have less cachet but also lower land prices.
The mayor of Hallandale Beach, Joy F. Cooper, says upscale residential developments have enlivened the city, where the median age of the population has dropped to 47 from 70-plus in 2005.
“We took the playbook right out of Miami Beach,” Cooper said, citing a “total gentrification of our community.”
Along Broward County’s 24-mile Atlantic coastline, 83 new residential buildings with about 7,900 units have been announced or are under construction, said real estate consultant Peter Zawlewski, who runs the website CraneSpotters.com.
“People are getting more comfortable with Broward than they were a few years back,” Zawlewski said. Prices per square foot for Broward condominium units frequently are half the price of comparable condos in Miami-Dade County’s coastal cities, including Miami Beach, Bal Harbour and Sunny Isles.
Jorge Perez, the leading condo developer in South Florida, said the market for condominium buildings on the Broward County coastline is “exploding.”
Perez is CEO of Miami-based Related Group, which is involved in multiple developments in Broward, among them the 171-unit Auberge Beach Residences and Spa, an oceanfront development in Fort Lauderdale.
“If that building [Auberge] was in South Beach, it would probably command close to $5,000 a square foot,” said Carlos Rosso, who heads the Related Group condominium division. “But because it’s Fort Lauderdale, spectacular luxury units with 20-feet-deep terraces are selling for $1,100 a square foot.”
Other Related Group developments in Broward include the 22-story Apogee Beach in Hollywood, where Perez himself bought a unit, and Beachwalk Resort, a 32-story condo-and-hotel tower on the Intracoastal Waterway in Hallandale that opened this year. Related also is developing the Hyde Resort and Residences, located near the border between Hallandale and Hollywood, and the recently announced Hyde Beach House on nearby site. [New York Times] – Mike Seemuth