Nearly 100 new SoFla condo buildings announced in 2015

Developers proposed nearly 100 new condo buildings with about 9,000 units east of I-95 in the tri-county South Florida region of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach in 2015.

On a year-over-year basis, the number of new South Florida projects announced in 2015 represents a 31 percent increase in the total number of condo buildings and a 22 percent increase in units from 2014, according to the preconstruction condo projects website CraneSpotters.com. (For disclosure, my firm operates the website.)

As of the week of Jan. 11, developers currently have 415 new South Florida condo buildings with nearly 49,600 units in the pipeline east of I-95, compared to a year earlier when 316 new condo buildings with more than 40,600 units were announced for the week of Jan. 12, 2015, according to the data.

It is worth noting that nearly 20 new condo towers with more than 2,800 units that had at one time been in the South Florida preconstruction pipeline have since been removed from the list, due to plan revisions by the respective developers.  

The majority of the new South Florida condo projects announced in 2015 were slated to be constructed in Miami-Dade, where 55 new condo buildings and more than 7,250 units were proposed between January and December of 2015.

Broward ranked second with 29 new condo buildings and more than 1,150 units announced last year.

Developers announced 15 new condo buildings with more than 550 units in Palm Beach in 2015.

With the 2015 project additions, 259 new condo buildings with nearly 36,350 units are slated to be built or have already been constructed in Miami-Dade since this cycle began in 2011.

Broward currently has 95 new condo buildings and more than 9,000 units announced during this cycle. Palm Beach has more than 60 new condo buildings with nearly 4,225 units in the pipeline to date.

The surge in new condo projects announced for South Florida occurred primarily in the first half of the year as developers reacted to a strong market for preconstruction units in 2014.

As the year 2015 passed, market conditions began to change due to rising preconstruction prices, a growing amount of resales available for purchase and a strengthening dollar against most international currencies.     

The unanswered question going forward is whether South Florida’s preconstruction condo market will experience a similar level of optimism for new projects in 2016 given a slowdown in the global economy.  

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.