Ugo Colombo pays off $236M construction loan for Brickell Flatiron

Bank OZK, Goldman Sachs’ Broad Street and RFR Realty provided the debt

Brickell Flatiron and Ugo Colombo
Brickell Flatiron and Ugo Colombo

UPDATED, Dec. 13, 3:50 p.m.: Ugo Colombo’s CMC Group paid off its construction for Brickell Flatiron, less than two months after the condo tower was completed.

The $236 million in construction debt was issued by Bank OZK, Goldman Sachs’ Broad Street, and RFR Realty in 2017. It broke down to a $138.5 million mortgage and a $97.5 million mezzanine loan.

Brickell Flatiron, a 64-story, 527-unit tower at 1000 Brickell Plaza, is one of the last large condo projects to be completed this cycle in Miami. It received its construction financing at a time when banks had already started to pull back on providing construction loans of that size.

Bank OZK, previously called Bank of the Ozarks, has become one of the most active construction lenders in South Florida, New York and L.A., among other markets. The Arkansas bank has a high concentration of condo construction loans, which banking experts generally say is risky, but it has said that it only lends to projects with high levels of equity. In earnings calls, the bank has said that it’s gotten paid back quickly from developers in Miami, specifically.

Brickell Flatiron is 95 percent sold and about half of its contracts have closed, according to a press release. Property records show 158 deeds have been recorded since November, which comes out to about 30 percent of the building.

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Remaining units are priced from $790,000 to $3 million, plus one upper duplex penthouse asking $8 million.

Architect Luis Revuelta designed the tower, and Massimo Iosa Ghini designed the interiors. The building features a 64th-floor amenities rooftop with a spa, pool and gym, a lap pool and children’s pool on the 18th floor, movie theater, billiards and cigar room, wine cellar, and electric car charging stations.

A London-based Japanese concept is expected to open in the ground floor retail space. CMC sold 24,800 square feet of the ground floor and mezzanine level space to Avi Dishi and Haim Yehezkel for $22.5 million. The buyers, who closed on the space last month, are still pursuing a lawsuit against CMC that alleges the developer changed the design of the commercial space.

Colombo’s next project could be Onda, an eight-story condo development he’s planning to build in Bay Harbor Islands with Valerio Morabito.