Developer terminates original plans for Six Midtown Miami

Downtown Miami and Peter Zalewski
Downtown Miami and Peter Zalewski

In the same week that a new condo tower launched construction in the Midtown Miami neighborhood of Miami, plans for another project that was to be located a few blocks away on the same street within the mixed-use complex, have been “terminated” — possibly to revise the original design.

On Friday, the Related Group and Dezer Properties held a groundbreaking ceremony to mark the start of construction on the planned 33-story Hyde Midtown condo tower with 470 units in the 3400 block of Northeast First Avenue in the Midtown Miami community, as The Real Deal reported.

A day earlier, on Thursday, the developer of the planned 32-story Six Midtown Miami Condominium tower with 398 residential units that was to be built on a vacant 2.1-acre site in the 3100 block of Northeast First Avenue filed a “Termination Of Condominium,” according to Miami-Dade County records.

The Six Midtown Miami Condo project was formally announced in July 2012 when the project’s developer Midtown Opportunities IVB LLC of Delaware filed a “Declaration of Condominium” with the county, records show. It’s a common step taken by developers before formally launching presales, during this era of hefty buyer deposits.

Alex Vadia, a principal with the Six Midtown Miami Condo development, was not available for comment by press time.

Up until last week’s termination of the planned Six Midtown Miami Condo, a typical sales-and-marketing campaign to attract buyers and brokers to the project had not yet formally begun.

A source familiar with the planned Six Midtown Miami Condo project said the termination was necessary in order to revise the original design of the planned condo tower — which dates back to the previous South Florida real estate cycle — to feature a different mix of floorplans and total number of units.

It is worth noting, the developer of the planned Six Midtown Miami Condo project had also filed “Declaration Of Condominium” paperwork — and a subsequent termination — for a project dubbed the Three Midtown Miami Condo, before selling the land and development rights for what is now known as the Hyde Midtown project.

At the time of the original filing of the “Declaration Of Condominium” for the Six Midtown Miami Condo, Greater Downtown Miami had far fewer new condo units and rental apartments planned for the market.

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Consider that the Six Midtown Miami project was the 20th new condo tower — and the Hyde Midtown project the 21st new tower — announced for Greater Downtown Miami during this South Florida real estate cycle that began in 2011, according to the preconstruction condo projects website CraneSpotters.com. (For disclosure, my firm operates the website.)

As of Monday, the number of new condo towers stands at 71 new condo towers active, and an additional eight towers — including the Six Midtown Miami Condo project — canceled or significantly revised during this cycle in Greater Downtown Miami during this cycle. The area stretches from the Julia Tuttle Causeway south to the Rickenbacker Causeway, and Biscayne Bay west to I-95.

In Greater Downtown Miami, developers have already completed seven new condo towers with a combined 1,900 units, and are constructing 23 more new condo towers with nearly 6,200 units in the area, according to the data.

An additional 41 new condo towers with nearly 13,000 units are currently in the planning or presale phase of development.

Besides the new condo towers announced for Greater Downtown Miami during this cycle, nearly 2,800 units are currently available for purchase on the resale market as of Monday, according to data from the Southeast Florida MLXchange.

In the first eight months of 2015, buyers acquired an average of less than 165 resale units monthly in Greater Downtown Miami. At the current transaction pace, Greater Downtown Miami has about 17 months of supply of resale condo units.

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

The unanswered question going forward is whether the planned Six Midtown Miami Condo project was terminated in an attempt to redesign the project to better appeal to buyers at a time of changing market conditions or as a precursor for a land sale.

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.