Centaur scores $160M loan for Panther National project in Avenir

Centaur Holdings landed a $160 million loan for Panther National, a planned luxury single-family home community near Palm Beach Gardens. 

West Palm Beach-based Southern Realty Trust and its affiliate, Sunrise Realty Trust, provided the financing, of which $85 million will refinance an existing note and the remainder will go toward the construction of Panther National’s second phase, a press release states. 

A Lotus Capital Partners team led by Faisal Ashraf arranged the loan on behalf of Centaur. 

Centaur, a Switzerland-based investment holding company, is developing Panther National on 392 acres within Avenir, a master-planned 4,800-acre community. Last year, Centaur completed 62 homes and an 18-hole golf course designed by retired golf legend Jack Nicklaus and two-time PGA champion Justin Thomas. 

The construction portion of the new loan will be used to build 156 houses, 24 villas, a 35,000-square-foot clubhouse, a fitness center and a golf training center, the release states. 

Centaur bought the development site for $60 million in 2021, records show. 

Founded last year, Southern Realty Trust is led by CEO Brian Sedrish, who spent a decade as managing director of Related Fund Management, an affiliate of Related Companies, the New York-based development firm founded by billionaire Steve Ross. Last month, Ross formed Related Ross which took over 2.8 million square feet of commercial properties, including completed and under construction buildings, as well as residential projects, in South Florida.

Financing Panther National’s second phase fits into Southern Realty Trust’s strategy of targeting projects in parts of the Southeast U.S. experiencing significant population growth, Sedrish told The Real Deal. 

“This particular deal really played on many of the themes that we’ve been spending a lot of time on, and that is targeting areas and projects that are meeting the demand from the migration that has occurred [in South Florida],” Sedrish said.

The emergence of West Palm Beach’s office market, fueled by investments and projects by Related Companies, has created “a tremendous amount of demand for high-end residential projects to accommodate a lot of these companies that have moved down that [provide] high-end, high-paying jobs,” Sedrish said. 

Panther National is the type of project that fills that demand, Sedrish said. “It fits the box of being in close proximity to areas that have seen real growth,” he said. “And again, it was quality sponsorship that we knew could execute on the business [plan].”

Once fully built, Avenir will have 3,900 residential units, mostly single-family homes; 200,000 square feet of medical offices; 400,000 square feet of retail and a 300-room hotel. Other developers at Avenir include PulteGroup, Toll Brothers and DiVosta Homes.