ASRR Capital Ltd. — the publicly-traded Israeli company led by New York real estate moguls Alex Sapir and Rotem Rosen — has signed a contract to purchase nearly an entire block in Miami’s Arts & Entertainment District for $33 million, as the firm targets Miami-Dade County for acquisitions.
The property runs from 17th Terrace to 18th Street, and between Northeast Second Avenue and Northeast Second Court. It excludes the “Real Padel Miami” courts but includes S&S Diner. The site is 60,000 square feet wide and has 1.5 million square feet of air rights. The contract was announced on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, where ASRR’s shares are traded.
The price equates to $546 per square foot for 60,375 square feet — or $22 per square foot for the air rights, likely the lowest price in the booming district — near the Adrienne Arsht Performing Arts Center and between downtown Miami and Midtown Miami — since the recession.
Currently, the site is occupied by a retail building built in 1924, two buildings built in 1937, including the S&S Diner, and a parking lot, Miami-Dade property records show. The seller is 17th and Second Avenue Properties Corp., whose directors are Enrique Manhard and Viviane Sasson. Manhard, an Uruguayan, owns Chic Parisien.
Sapir and Rosen declined to comment on the purchase. It is unclear what the developers plan for the site, but the zoning permits residential, commercial and retail use.
Nearby, the condo project Canvas and multifamily project Melody Tower are underway. In January 2015, a 7.4-acre lot at the corner of Northeast Second Avenue and 17th Street sold for $64 million.
ASRR Capital has been active in the past year both in Miami-Dade County and in New York.
In October, ASRR Capital teamed up with fashion heavyweight Gerard Guez on a $13.3 million contract for an office tower in downtown Miami. The deal for Tower 33, a 14-story, 95,000-square-foot building at 33 Southwest Second Avenue in Miami, equated to $140 per square foot.
ASRR made its first foray into South Florida last year when it paid $40 million for an oceanfront building in Surfside, in a joint venture with the Turkish conglomerate Suzer Group. Together with Turkish businesswoman Ozlem Onal, the group plans to build an ultra-high end hotel and condos. Onal’s family owns the Turkish luxury hotel chain Dedeman Hotels & Resorts, which operates 16 hotels in Turkey, Russia and Kazakhstan. Across the street, the investors plan to put a parking lot, and on top of that, a tennis court.
Among ASRR’s deals in New York, Sapir and Rosen leased 2.3 million square feet at 11 Madison Avenue to Credit Suisse, Sony and Yelp in 2014, and then sold the office building for $2.6 billion in August 2015, marking the largest single-building sale in New York history. Through ASRR, Sapir and Rosen are raising low interest bonds on the Israeli stock market to invest in the U.S. real estate market.