Construction company sues Jockey Club III over allegedly unpaid bill

Jockey Club III's condo board and associations for the other two towers have been locked in a stand-off with a trio of developers who want to build a new tower and hotel on 13 acres of common grounds

Rendering of Apeiron at the Jockey Club with Muayad 'Mo' Abbas
Rendering of Apeiron at the Jockey Club with Muayad 'Mo' Abbas

Another legal battle is brewing at the Jockey Club condo complex in northeast Miami-Dade.

North Bay Village-based AG Contractors Corp. last month sued Jockey Club III Association in Miami-Dade Circuit Court for nonpayment of construction services that commenced in 2016.

During that time, Jockey Club III’s condo board and the associations for the other two towers at 11111 Biscayne Boulevard have been locked in a tense stand-off with a trio of developers who want to build a new condo tower and hotel on 13 acres of common grounds.

The three condo associations and Aperion Miami, which is led by Horst Schulze, Michael Bedner and Muayad Abbas, have filed lawsuits against one another that are still pending. According to the recent complaint by AG, the Jockey Club III Association hired the company on June 20, 2016, to renovate the 21-story building. Xavier Franco, the lawyer representing AG, said his client provided $580,876 in construction materials and labor, but is still waiting on a $58,451 final payment.

“We sent demands, we sent emails, and we sent emissaries,” Franco said. “We did everything possible to keep this out of court, but at some point they stopped responding and never gave a reason that would justify withholding the payment.”

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Attorneys for Jockey Club III could not be reached for comment.

In March 2016, the associations for Jockey Club I and Jockey Club II sued Aperion Miami to try and stop the development. The associations alleged that Aperion was in violation of two binding agreements dating back to 1977 and 1995 that essentially blocked all new development at the club.

However, Jockey Club III sided with the developers and sued the two other condo boards for trying to block Aperion’s plans. The association also accused Jockey Club I and Jockey Club II of severely mismanaging property maintenance and doing unpermitted construction work that resulted in notices of violation from the county.

In May 2017, a judge issued a final order for Aperion Miami that gave the developers the right to build their project and to take over maintenance of the property. Six months later, the Biscayne Shores Community Council unanimously approved Aperion’s plans which call for two new 40-story towers that will have 90 hotel rooms and 240 condos.

Plans call for two 40-story towers with a total of 90 hotel rooms and 240 condos, with the residences receiving service from the hotel portion. As it stands now, the Jockey Club complex has three condo towers, two of which are 21 stories and one is 13 stories. They were built between 1971 and 1982 and house 411 units in total.