Affiliated Nabs Construction Loan for Live Local Act Rentals

Affiliated Development scored a $73 million construction loan for a Live Local Act project in Boynton Beach, amid a rush to build apartments under the state workforce housing law.

Fort Lauderdale-based Affiliated, a workforce and affordable rentals developer, started construction of The Dune with 336 units on a 4.3-acre site at 2607 and 2617 South Federal Highway, steps from the Intracoastal Waterway, according to records and the developer’s news release.

Pacific Life Insurance provided the financing. Affiliated also tapped equity from family office capital partners and its Affiliated Housing Impact Fund, the release says. The firm launched a fund last year, with the goal of raising $250 million for mixed-income multifamily projects in Florida.

The Dune will consist of an eight-story, 298-unit building; 38 three-story rental townhomes; and retail, the release says. Out of the 336 apartments, 198 will be reserved for households earning from 80 percent to 120 percent of the area median income. The Florida Housing Finance Corporation shows Palm Beach County’s annual AMI is $111,800. This is expected to be updated in the spring.

Affiliate’s designation of 59 percent of units as workforce rentals exceeds Live Local’s requirement that at least 40 percent of apartments are at below-market rents.

The state law, first approved in 2023 and tweaked the subsequent two years, incentivizes inclusion of affordable and workforce rentals in projects by allowing developers to build bigger projects than zoning permits and granting them property tax breaks. Through the law, developers also can bypass public hearings and score approvals administratively.

Affiliated bought The Dune site in 2024 for $12 million, according to records.

The firm, led by Jeff Burns and Nick Rojo, has about a dozen multifamily projects in South Florida. Its completed buildings include the 142-unit The Six13 in Fort Lauderdale, 200-unit Bohemian and 230-unit MID in Lake Worth Beach, and 301-unit The Grand in downtown West Palm Beach.

Also in Boynton Beach, Affiliated plans the 300-unit The Pierce workforce rentals project with 17,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space at Ocean Avenue and Federal Highway, near the intracoastal. Construction of The Pierce is expected to start this year, according to the release.

Developers have seized on the Live Local Act with a flurry of project applications, with a few also scoring construction financing and starting to build their complexes.

Coral Rock Development Group landed $54 million last month to build the eight-story, 227-unit Dulce Vida Live Local Act apartment building in Miami’s Allapattah. Developer Daniel Abreu scored a $16.5 million construction loan in 2024 for an 80-unit apartment building near North Miami.

Only a handful of Live Local projects have been completed since the law passed.

Across Florida, developers finished nearly 3,200 below-market rentals under the legislation in 23 projects, according to a Florida TaxWatch, a nonpartisan and nonprofit research institute. The pipeline consists of 43,400 units across 143 projects that are in various stages from proposed to approved, research from the nonprofit Florida Housing Coalition shows.