24th new condo building proposed for Bay Harbor Islands

Developers have announced a 24th new condo building for the town of Bay Harbor Islands — a community of nearly 5,900 residents — located in the barrier island area of Northeast Miami-Dade County.

The new project — dubbed the Bay Harbor Gardens — is slated to stand eight stories tall, with a rooftop pool area and 30 condo units in the 1100 block of 93rd Street, according to Bay Harbor Islands government records.

The project is being developed by Furmanos LLC with the trio of Andres Caceres, Juan C. Furiati and Vicente H. Furiati Jr. of Key Biscayne, on a pair of vacant lots totaling 0.5 acre just south of the Ruth K. Broad Bay Harbor K-8 Center school, according to Miami-Dade Property Appraiser and Florida Department of State records.

Bay Harbor Islands — a municipality made up of a pair of islands situated in Biscayne Bay between the city of North Miami to the west on the mainland and the municipalities of Bal Harbour and Surfside to the east on the barrier island — is one of the most active preconstruction condo markets for new buildings in South Florida, according to the preconstruction condo projects website CraneSpotters.com. (For disclosure, my firm operates the website.)

With this newest project, Bay Harbor Islands now has two dozen new condo buildings with nearly 750 units announced for the town’s east island.

Overall, developers have announced more than 330 new condo towers with nearly 43,000 units to be built east of Interstate 95 in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties as of Monday, according to the data.

The preconstruction boom in Bay Harbor Islands — with presale prices starting at less than $400 per square foot — is being propelled as a cheaper alternative to the high premiums reportedly being achieved by new condo projects nearby in Bal Harbour and Surfside, where minimum prices start at more than $1,300 per square foot, according to the CraneSpotters.com Developers Price Survey for February 2015.

As the preconstruction boom rages in the barrier island area, condo resales in Bay Harbor Islands are performing modestly well.

Nearly 90 condo units are on the resale market at an average price of about $357 per square foot in Bay Harbor Islands as of Monday, according to the Southeast Florida MLXchange.

In 2014, buyers acquired nearly 150 condo units at an average resale price of about $240 per square foot, according to the data.

Based on the 2014 resale pace of 12 transactions monthly, Bay Harbor Islands currently has slightly more than seven months of condo supply available for purchase.

A balanced market is considered to have about six months of condo supply available for purchase. More months of inventory indicates a buyer’s market, and less months of supply suggests a seller’s market.

The unanswered question going forward is whether enough buyers will be interested in purchasing — even at cheaper prices — all of the new and existing condo units that are currently available and planned for the Bay Harbor Islands market.  

Peter Zalewski is a real estate columnist for The Real Deal who founded Condo Vultures LLC, a consultancy and publishing company, as well as Condo Vultures Realty LLC and CVR Realty brokerages and the Condo Ratings Agency, an analytics firm. The Condo Ratings Agency operates CraneSpotters.com, a preconstruction condo projects website, in conjunction with the Miami Association of Realtors.