Developer proposes 978-unit apartment complex on Fort Lauderdale mobile home park

A developer wants to build a 978-unit apartment complex at the Pan American Estates Mobile Home Park in Fort Lauderdale. 

Saulo Perez, a South Florida-based real estate developer, proposes the project on the 22.8-acre mobile home park at 150 Northwest 68th Street in the Cypress Creek neighborhood, according to city records. 

The Fort Lauderdale Development Review Committee is expected to vote on the project at its meeting on Tuesday. 

Designed by MSA Architects, the project would be developed in three phases. Phase I would have 329 apartments in five five-story buildings and a lake. Phase II would have 290 units in four five-story buildings and four townhouses in a row of two-story buildings, according to the application submitted last month. The third phase would consist of an eight-story, 355-unit building. In total, the project would have 1,544 parking spaces. 

The project’s design is reminiscent of Rosemary Beach, an area on Florida’s Gulf Coast known for its architectural style that’s similar to the French Quarter in New Orleans. 

Perez, through his Cypress Development LLC, bought the mobile home park site in October, records show. A deed lists the price as a nominal amount of $10. 

Pan American Estates, once home to more than 200 families, has been mostly vacated after households were offered a financial incentive to move out, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported. 

Perez, a Miami-based real estate developer, has been affiliated with Dallas-based Trammell Crow Residential. His LinkedIn lists his work on a number of Trammell’s Alexan-branded multifamily developments. In 2020, while at Trammell, he represented the firm in its $19.2 million purchase of an 11.3-acre development site at 8300 Park Boulevard in Doral. Private equity giant Carlyle was a co-buyer. 

Perez, who also is an attorney, represented Metro Apartments LLC in the $6.3 million sale of a development site at 239 and 243 Southwest Ninth Street in Miami’s Brickell in 2020. 

Perez’s real estate firm is now REZFlorida, according to Stephanie Toothaker, the attorney who filed the Pan American Estates redevelopment application on behalf of Perez. 

Redevelopment of South Florida mobile home parks is on the rise. Near North Miami, Ram Realty Advisors proposed last summer a 400-unit mixed-use multifamily project with 50,000 square feet of retail at the Biscayne Breeze Mobile Home Park site at 11380 Biscayne Boulevard in an unincorporated area of Miami-Dade County. The development site includes the adjacent properties at 11320 and 11340 Biscayne Boulevard. 

Also last summer, entities managed by David Mordekhay in Hollywood and Tom Grinberg and Gary Otto in Miami sought Miami-Dade’s permission to tear down the Soar Mobile Home Park at 8050 Northwest Miami Court and build nearly 4,000 apartments. Soar is in unincorporated Miami-Dade, between El Portal and Miami.