Over the last decade, David Burstyn has watched the South Florida lending market explode from a front row seat.
The Miami native is CEO of Winston Capital Management LLC, a business purpose real estate lender and investor with deep ties to the South Florida building and banking communities. As wealth migration has reshaped the region’s real estate market, Winston Capital has grown to meet the demand, doing over $200 million in loans last year with deal sizes close to $40 million and rising. TRD spoke with Burstyn about the changes in the South Florida market he’s seen since opening Winston Capital in 2015.
Bigger Deals, Tighter Turnarounds
Since the pandemic, the story of the Miami market has been one of wealth migration, which has driven up the demand for undeveloped land and new construction homes that can reach into the nine figures. Rather than pinching pennies, this type of clientele expects a high quality of service for their money.
“There’s a lot of ultra-wealthy people in Florida now,” says Burstyn. “To these people, it doesn’t matter if it’s $30 million or $35 million. If they like the product, they’re going to buy the product.”
This means that Burstyn has watched the deals get larger and the timelines get shorter, a scenario that plays into Winston’s strengths as a nimble, highly-embedded player in the Miami real estate world.
“Winston provides a white glove service. We charge for time,” says Burstyn. “People want what they want, and if they want money in large amounts at a fast pace, they’re willing to pay for it.”
By leveraging the company’s access to capital and banking relationships, Winston punches above its weight. It’s the rare boutique shop that competes with institutional players for big deals where complexity and timeliness are the determining factors.
The Homefield Advantage
Winston’s edge in the Miami market comes from Burstyn’s ability to see opportunities and then work his network of connections that dates back to his grandfather, who came to Miami in the 1970s to build apartment hotels.
“David is great about finding very good but unusual deals in the market,” says Joe Hernandez, Partner at Bilzin Sumberg. “He finds ways to do deals that don’t always fit nicely into the boxes of institutional lenders but nonetheless have a high demand.”
One of Winston’s frequent partners is City National Bank of Florida. Over the years, Burstyn has developed a strong rapport with CNB Florida CEO Jorge Gonzalez and Senior Vice President Ricardo Garbati.
“We have a very good working relationship with City National Bank,” says Burstyn. “If Ricardo shakes my hand, I know the deal is done. Winston passes this comfort down to its borrowers.”
“Because everyone enjoys working together, people are working and talking until 10 or 11 PM,” says Burstyn. “We’ve seen it happen where you can get a $38 million loan closed in a matter of 10 or 15 days.”
These strong local ties give Winston a major advantage over lenders who might want to jump into the hot Miami market without paying their dues and building these networks.
“There’s tremendous value in these relationships,” explains Hernandez. “It saves a lot of transaction time when there’s mutual respect amongst the professionals.”
Signature Deals
Take, for example, Winston’s $32.5 million refinance at 9 Indian Creek Island Road, an undeveloped lot next to Amazon Founder Jeff Bezos’s home on the exclusive island.
“There was another lender that had the deal signed up but was not able to close, and passed the deal to us,” recalls Burstyn.
The complex deal involved Bilzin Sumberg’s Joe Hernandez, an old friend who is frequently involved (“on both sides,” says Burstyn) with Winston deals. “Joe has closed about $110 Million over the last 12 months for Winston.”
“9 Indian Creek Island Road was essentially two transactions going on at once,” explains Hernandez. “The loan was made based upon a property on Indian Creek, and then as soon as that loan was made, it was subsequently assigned to a third party.”
Within a month of work, including many late-night phone calls, Winston had closed the deal. Twelve months later, another lender paid off Winston and put a $42 million loan on it.
“Now that property is for sale for $200 million because the piece of land is adjacent to Bezos’s house,” says Burstyn. “So that was a very notable loan.”
Winston extended another sizable loan to seasoned developer Vivian Dimond for a single family mansion at 1460 South Ocean Boulevard. Dimond had come in to “clean up some of the mess” after the property was put into foreclosure and secured a $38.5 million bridge loan from Winston. Today, the house is on the market for $79 million.
Winston Capital Provides Business Purpose Loans to Real Estate Investors. To learn more about Winston Capital, visit their website.