MIAMI -- Foreign tourists who for years have crowded Florida’s shopping malls to buy clothes and electronics, are now flocking to real estate offices to snatch up apartments and homes at bargain-basement prices.
The investors, mainly from Europe and Latin America, are jostling over apartments in Miami’s trendy South Beach neighborhood selling for $70,000-$100,000, and in less exclusive areas to the north where they start at around $50,000.
“The buying opportunities are maybe the best ever. Who knows if we’ll see prices again like today’s in Miami Beach,” Keys Real Estate agent Michelle Iglesias told AFP.
Property prices in Miami have fallen by almost half (47%) since the real estate bubble peaked in 2006, according to Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller 20-City Home Price index.
Analysts predict that real estate market prices will not increase until the banks get rid of all their foreclosed properties and there are more jobs in the region.
“Unemployment is still high. People are afraid of losing their homes and credit is hard to get,” said Standard & Poor’s vice-president Maureen Maitland.
In and around Miami, banks each month repossess about 5,000 properties, including apartments and commercial real estate, for delinquent mortgage payments, according to real estate brokerage CondoVultures Realty, which has 250,000 such properties on its books across southern Florida.
But foreign investors have kept prices from plunging even further, the Miami Association of Realtors said in its November report. “The international buyers continue to fuel market strengthening, we continue to observe positive signs,” said association president Oliver Ruiz.
Beatriz Lamanda from Venezuela bought two apartments north of Miami Beach for a reduced price of $80,000.
“I’d rather put my money in real estate than leave it in the bank. In a few years I’ll make a nice bundle because the prices are going to go up, no question,” she told AFP.
In the “Icon,” a three-building apartment complex by French designer Philippe Starck in Brickell, Miami’s newest financial district, apartments are selling for $250,000, down from $370,000 two years ago.
“We’ve sold 350 units in the last few months. Most of the buyers are international,” Fortune International’s Alejandra Castillo told AFP. -- AFP
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Brickell Avenue Speed Limit to be Cut - December 15, 2010
The Florida Department of Transportation now says it will lower the speed limit and make engineering changes to Brickell Avenue, after complaints that the road was dangerous for walkers and cyclists.
BY ANDRES VIGLUCCI
aviglucci@MiamiHerald.com
Bowing to persistent pressure from Brickell residents, bicycle and pedestrian activists, and city and county officials, state roadway engineers have agreed to reduce speeds along busy Brickell Avenue, as well as add crosswalks and "share-the-road" markings to improve safety.
The changes will be incorporated into a year-long,$9 million resurfacing of the 1.6-mile state road that is slated to begin in January, Gus Pego, district secretary for the Florida Department of Transportation, said Tuesday.
Pego stressed that the agency agreed to the bike- and pedestrian-friendly measures after new engineering studies conducted in the past few weeks found them to be justified.
"We've been responsive to the issues brought to us," Pego told The Miami Herald.
The alterations to the resurfacing project mark a significant concession by FDOT. Agency engineers had until recently insisted they could make few of the changes demanded by residents, activists and local officials.
Critics argued that a shortage of crosswalks forced people to jaywalk and complained speeding cars imperil the growing number of pedestrians and joggers along the avenue, the spine of Miami's densest district -- a rapidly changing area that residents and city planners envision as a walkable, bikeable urban neighborhood.
The dynamic began to shift for several reasons. Last month, a 30-year Brickell Bay Club resident, Rosa Encalada, 83, was struck and killed by a taxi as she tried to cross the avenue on a Sunday evening.
FDOT engineers, meanwhile, took a verbal beating from angry residents and activists at a public meeting last week and in blog posts by TransitMiami.com and the South Florida Bicycle Coalition.
And public officials -- including Miami Mayor Tomás Regalado, Commission Chairman Marc Sarnoff and Miami-Dade Commissioner Carlos Gimenez -- intervened forcefully with Pego.
Tuesday evening, Encalada's family held a candlelight vigil at the spot near 2300 Brickell where she was struck.
"That's wonderful news," Teresa Encalada, the woman's daughter-in-law, said of Pego's decision. "That's what we wanted."
In return for FDOT's concessions, Sarnoff said, the city will immediately step up traffic enforcement along Brickell, including at a flashing-light pedestrian crosswalk recently installed by the state agency along the residential south half of the avenue.
Sarnoff said too many motorists have been ignoring the yield-to-pedestrians signal, as he found out when he drove the avenue every day for the past two weeks to gauge conditions.
"I watched a few old ladies try to cross from the west side to the east side, and motorists were just gunning it to beat them," Sarnoff said.
The issues brought up by residents, bike activists and leaders of the Brickell Homeowners Association included a neighborhood-incompatible speed limit of 40 mph along the residential stretch of Brickell, a shortage of marked crosswalks and a lack of signage or pavement markings indicating that motorists should share the right lane with bicycles.
FDOT has agreed to:
• Reduce the speed limit to 35 mph along the residential stretch between Southeast 15th Road and the entrance to the Rickenbacker Causeway.
That will make the entirety of Brickell 35 mph -- the same speed as the connected Biscayne Boulevard to its north. Though that's higher than the 25 to 30 mph some Brickell residents wanted, Sarnoff said it marks "a step in the right direction."
"Thirty-five is a manageable speed," he said.
• Add a new marked crosswalk in the 1400 block of Brickell, in the business district. Also, some crosswalks that now exist along one side of an intersection but not the other will be completed so that pedestrians will have marked crossings on all four corners.
• Southbound and northbound right lanes will be slightly widened and marked with "sharrows" -- chevron-shaped stripes and an outline of a bike on the pavement to indicate that motorists must share those lanes with cyclists. The road isn't wide enough to accommodate separate bike lanes.
During construction, Pego said, all speeds along Brickell will be reduced to 30 mph.
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/12/14/1973912/brickell-avenue-speed-limit-to.html#ixzz18DY6ytGE
BY ANDRES VIGLUCCI
aviglucci@MiamiHerald.com
Bowing to persistent pressure from Brickell residents, bicycle and pedestrian activists, and city and county officials, state roadway engineers have agreed to reduce speeds along busy Brickell Avenue, as well as add crosswalks and "share-the-road" markings to improve safety.
The changes will be incorporated into a year-long,$9 million resurfacing of the 1.6-mile state road that is slated to begin in January, Gus Pego, district secretary for the Florida Department of Transportation, said Tuesday.
Pego stressed that the agency agreed to the bike- and pedestrian-friendly measures after new engineering studies conducted in the past few weeks found them to be justified.
"We've been responsive to the issues brought to us," Pego told The Miami Herald.
The alterations to the resurfacing project mark a significant concession by FDOT. Agency engineers had until recently insisted they could make few of the changes demanded by residents, activists and local officials.
Critics argued that a shortage of crosswalks forced people to jaywalk and complained speeding cars imperil the growing number of pedestrians and joggers along the avenue, the spine of Miami's densest district -- a rapidly changing area that residents and city planners envision as a walkable, bikeable urban neighborhood.
The dynamic began to shift for several reasons. Last month, a 30-year Brickell Bay Club resident, Rosa Encalada, 83, was struck and killed by a taxi as she tried to cross the avenue on a Sunday evening.
FDOT engineers, meanwhile, took a verbal beating from angry residents and activists at a public meeting last week and in blog posts by TransitMiami.com and the South Florida Bicycle Coalition.
And public officials -- including Miami Mayor Tomás Regalado, Commission Chairman Marc Sarnoff and Miami-Dade Commissioner Carlos Gimenez -- intervened forcefully with Pego.
Tuesday evening, Encalada's family held a candlelight vigil at the spot near 2300 Brickell where she was struck.
"That's wonderful news," Teresa Encalada, the woman's daughter-in-law, said of Pego's decision. "That's what we wanted."
In return for FDOT's concessions, Sarnoff said, the city will immediately step up traffic enforcement along Brickell, including at a flashing-light pedestrian crosswalk recently installed by the state agency along the residential south half of the avenue.
Sarnoff said too many motorists have been ignoring the yield-to-pedestrians signal, as he found out when he drove the avenue every day for the past two weeks to gauge conditions.
"I watched a few old ladies try to cross from the west side to the east side, and motorists were just gunning it to beat them," Sarnoff said.
The issues brought up by residents, bike activists and leaders of the Brickell Homeowners Association included a neighborhood-incompatible speed limit of 40 mph along the residential stretch of Brickell, a shortage of marked crosswalks and a lack of signage or pavement markings indicating that motorists should share the right lane with bicycles.
FDOT has agreed to:
• Reduce the speed limit to 35 mph along the residential stretch between Southeast 15th Road and the entrance to the Rickenbacker Causeway.
That will make the entirety of Brickell 35 mph -- the same speed as the connected Biscayne Boulevard to its north. Though that's higher than the 25 to 30 mph some Brickell residents wanted, Sarnoff said it marks "a step in the right direction."
"Thirty-five is a manageable speed," he said.
• Add a new marked crosswalk in the 1400 block of Brickell, in the business district. Also, some crosswalks that now exist along one side of an intersection but not the other will be completed so that pedestrians will have marked crossings on all four corners.
• Southbound and northbound right lanes will be slightly widened and marked with "sharrows" -- chevron-shaped stripes and an outline of a bike on the pavement to indicate that motorists must share those lanes with cyclists. The road isn't wide enough to accommodate separate bike lanes.
During construction, Pego said, all speeds along Brickell will be reduced to 30 mph.
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/12/14/1973912/brickell-avenue-speed-limit-to.html#ixzz18DY6ytGE
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
High-End Movie Theater in the Works for Downtown Miami - December 8, 2010
The latest attraction coming to downtown Miami: a 12-screen movie theater.
BY HANNAH SAMPSON
hsampson@MiamiHerald.com
In a move that signals confidence in Miami's economic recovery -- and potential for growth in the city's urban core -- the developer of the downtown Metropolitan Miami complex announced plans to add a high-end movie theater.
Plans call for the new theater at the Metropolitan Miami complex to open by late 2012 or early 2013. It will join a Whole Foods, set for completion in 2013, and the already-open Met 1 residential tower, Wells Fargo Center office tower and JW Marriott Marquis and Hotel Beaux Arts.
Adding a multiplex is the latest step in making the area a place where people want to live, work and play. That's a dramatic change of scenery from 10 years ago, when fewer than 40,000 people lived downtown and there was a dearth of options compared to other cities with cosmopolitan credentials.
But the building boom added towering high-rise buildings with 23,000 units -- and the bust made those units more affordable for young professionals who wanted to live near their jobs. Now, 70,000 people live downtown, and the Miami Downtown Development Authority expects another 10,000 to move in by 2014.
The theater, said DDA executive director Alyce Robertson, was a missing piece for those new residents.
"This is an amenity that adds to the ambience of a 24-7 residential, commercial and entertainment district," Robertson said.
MDM Development Group said Tuesday that it had finalized an agreement with luxury theater company Silverspot to open a 55,000-square-foot, 12-screen theater as the anchor for the planned Met Square entertainment complex. It will also include retail and restaurant space.
"This is a total game-changer for the market," said Lyle Stern, principal with Koniver Stern Group, the retail leasing representative of Metropolitan Miami. "It's real urban living."
The downtown Miami corridor has added thousands of residents and dozens of restaurants, shops and hotels over the past decade. But the broader downtown area hasn't had a movie theater since the AMC at Omni International Mall closed in 1999 -- and even that was more than a mile north of the proposed site near Biscayne Boulevard and Southeast Third Avenue.
For a night out at the movies, downtown residents have to drive to South Beach, Coconut Grove or South Miami.
Those are attorney Eric Bluestein's options -- though he finds himself watching movies at home more often than venturing out to a theater these days.
"I like movies a lot," said Bluestein, 28, who lives in the Met 1 building. "Once they put a theater next to me, I'll definitely be going quite a bit."
Miami City Commissioner Marc Sarnoff, who chairs the DDA, said downtown offers sports with the AmericanAirlines Arena and arts with the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, but lacks what he called the "simple pleasures" of going to the movies.
"It makes it a whole community," he said. "There's no reason you have to leave."
The closest movie option, Paragon Grove 13, reopened in June after going dark for renovations for eight months at Coconut Grove's CocoWalk. Like the planned theater, that cinema sells wine and beer and allows patrons to reserve specific seats.
Silverspot, which has one other location, in Naples, boasts luxuries like large leather seats, hardwood floors and marble and glass finishes. Though pricing for Miami isn't yet available, general admission for adults at the Naples location is $15.
MDM did not disclose projected development costs for the theater at the $1 billion Metropolitan Miami complex.
James Marsh, a media and entertainment analyst for Piper Jaffray, said chains worldwide have been experimenting with offering high-end moviegoing experiences. He said the concept hasn't yet been proven, but it could be a smarter move than trying to compete with nearby megaplexes.
Movies in general have fared "remarkably well" during the economic recession, Marsh said, despite the abundance of entertainment options on home television screens and mobile devices.
For Bluestein, who also works downtown, the promise of having a grocery store and movie theater in his back yard is "like a dream come true."
"It'll definitely make life a lot easier," he said. "Anytime you can avoid traffic down here, it lessens your stress."
His prediction: "I'm going to become a downtown hermit."
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/12/07/1962662/high-end-movie-theater-in-the.html#ixzz17X4dUfy7
Our comment: Whoo-hoo!
BY HANNAH SAMPSON
hsampson@MiamiHerald.com
In a move that signals confidence in Miami's economic recovery -- and potential for growth in the city's urban core -- the developer of the downtown Metropolitan Miami complex announced plans to add a high-end movie theater.
Plans call for the new theater at the Metropolitan Miami complex to open by late 2012 or early 2013. It will join a Whole Foods, set for completion in 2013, and the already-open Met 1 residential tower, Wells Fargo Center office tower and JW Marriott Marquis and Hotel Beaux Arts.
Adding a multiplex is the latest step in making the area a place where people want to live, work and play. That's a dramatic change of scenery from 10 years ago, when fewer than 40,000 people lived downtown and there was a dearth of options compared to other cities with cosmopolitan credentials.
But the building boom added towering high-rise buildings with 23,000 units -- and the bust made those units more affordable for young professionals who wanted to live near their jobs. Now, 70,000 people live downtown, and the Miami Downtown Development Authority expects another 10,000 to move in by 2014.
The theater, said DDA executive director Alyce Robertson, was a missing piece for those new residents.
"This is an amenity that adds to the ambience of a 24-7 residential, commercial and entertainment district," Robertson said.
MDM Development Group said Tuesday that it had finalized an agreement with luxury theater company Silverspot to open a 55,000-square-foot, 12-screen theater as the anchor for the planned Met Square entertainment complex. It will also include retail and restaurant space.
"This is a total game-changer for the market," said Lyle Stern, principal with Koniver Stern Group, the retail leasing representative of Metropolitan Miami. "It's real urban living."
The downtown Miami corridor has added thousands of residents and dozens of restaurants, shops and hotels over the past decade. But the broader downtown area hasn't had a movie theater since the AMC at Omni International Mall closed in 1999 -- and even that was more than a mile north of the proposed site near Biscayne Boulevard and Southeast Third Avenue.
For a night out at the movies, downtown residents have to drive to South Beach, Coconut Grove or South Miami.
Those are attorney Eric Bluestein's options -- though he finds himself watching movies at home more often than venturing out to a theater these days.
"I like movies a lot," said Bluestein, 28, who lives in the Met 1 building. "Once they put a theater next to me, I'll definitely be going quite a bit."
Miami City Commissioner Marc Sarnoff, who chairs the DDA, said downtown offers sports with the AmericanAirlines Arena and arts with the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, but lacks what he called the "simple pleasures" of going to the movies.
"It makes it a whole community," he said. "There's no reason you have to leave."
The closest movie option, Paragon Grove 13, reopened in June after going dark for renovations for eight months at Coconut Grove's CocoWalk. Like the planned theater, that cinema sells wine and beer and allows patrons to reserve specific seats.
Silverspot, which has one other location, in Naples, boasts luxuries like large leather seats, hardwood floors and marble and glass finishes. Though pricing for Miami isn't yet available, general admission for adults at the Naples location is $15.
MDM did not disclose projected development costs for the theater at the $1 billion Metropolitan Miami complex.
James Marsh, a media and entertainment analyst for Piper Jaffray, said chains worldwide have been experimenting with offering high-end moviegoing experiences. He said the concept hasn't yet been proven, but it could be a smarter move than trying to compete with nearby megaplexes.
Movies in general have fared "remarkably well" during the economic recession, Marsh said, despite the abundance of entertainment options on home television screens and mobile devices.
For Bluestein, who also works downtown, the promise of having a grocery store and movie theater in his back yard is "like a dream come true."
"It'll definitely make life a lot easier," he said. "Anytime you can avoid traffic down here, it lessens your stress."
His prediction: "I'm going to become a downtown hermit."
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/12/07/1962662/high-end-movie-theater-in-the.html#ixzz17X4dUfy7
Our comment: Whoo-hoo!
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Foreclosed Home Mistakenly Sold to Two Different Buyers - December 7, 2010
David Stern's beleaguered law firm's foreclosure mistake led two people to buy same house in Cutler Bay.
BY DIANE C. LADE AND DOREEN HEMLOCK
Sun Sentinel
Real estate investor Marjorie Oster was pleased when she snagged what looked like a good deal through a Miami-Dade County foreclosure court auction: a four-bedroom house in Cutler Bay, with a swimming pool, for about $95,000.
But when her husband drove by the next day to check on the property, he saw "someone cleaning the pool, a lawn service cutting the grass and a note it was being tented for termites," said Oster, a Miami resident who has been in real estate for 15 years.
It turns out the house she thought she had purchased had been sold in a short sale the week before to someone else -- Osberto Jimenez, a 40-year-old truck driver. The law firm handling the foreclosure for the lender mishandled the paperwork and never canceled the auction sale.
"So we both own the same house and I'm frustrated as hell," Oster said. "Someone screwed up."
New attorneys representing CitiMortgage say that "someone" was David Stern's beleaguered law office, which originally represented the lender. Citi ultimately pulled the case from Stern's offices and gave it to Shapiro and Fishman, another large South Florida foreclosure firm that represents banks and loan servicers.
Both law offices, along with two others, are under investigation by the Florida Attorney General. They're accused of engaging in shoddy practices, including fabricating documents. Shapiro and Fishman has defended its practices and said it did nothing wrong. Jeffrey Tew, the attorney representing Stern, declined to comment.
Stern, who at one point claimed he processed 20 percent of the state's foreclosures through a staff of more than 1,000, has been forced to lay off the vast majority of his employees as his biggest clients continue to abandon him. Citi spokesman Mark Rodgers declined to comment specifically on the Cutler Bay double sale, but said the company stopped referring new foreclosures to Stern in September and now has removed all of its business from the firm.
Attorneys general in 50 states continue to investigate reports of servicers and foreclosure firms like Stern's "robo-signing" hundreds of thousands of affidavits without reviewing them.
In the situation with the Cutler Bay house, attorney Leora B. Freire, with Shapiro and Fishman, said Stern's office didn't notify the courts to take the house out of the foreclosure auction after the short sale had been processed.
Oster and Citi reached an agreement last week, Freire said, vacating Oster's sale, which allows Jimenez to keep the house. Oster said she would be refunded her money, paid some interest, and have her legal fees covered.
Documents show Oster bought the property for cash on Oct. 6 and received a certificate of title. Seven days earlier, Jimenez executed a warranty deed and took out a $123,000 mortgage in a short sale approved by CitiMortgage and the previous owners.
The tsunami of negative news about Stern's operation had Oster fearing she never would see her money again. She said she contacted the office numerous times for more than a month, but attorneys either would not return her calls or couldn't tell her what had happened to her payment.
"I just wanted out because it was David Stern's firm," she said.
Mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, who comprised the majority of Stern's referrals, pulled all of their cases from the firm over the past two months. Shapiro and Fishman, however, remain on Fannie's referral list.
Darryl Wilson, a professor and real estate expert at Stetson University's College of Law, said that while selling the same house twice was "quite strange," it does happen -- and increasingly more so lately, as lenders, attorneys and the courts scramble to push a huge number of foreclosures through the pipeline.
While there is no specific statute addressing double sales, Wilson said basic common law suggests that the first person buying the property would have the first rights to it. But the outcome could vary according to the specifics in each case, Wilson said.
Jimenez, who came from Cuba five years ago, said he always assumed he would get to keep his home because he bought it first. He already has started renovating the kitchen and decorated the yard with holiday lights.
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/12/07/1960976/foreclosed-home-mistakenly-sold.html#ixzz17SKbOXR6
BY DIANE C. LADE AND DOREEN HEMLOCK
Sun Sentinel
Real estate investor Marjorie Oster was pleased when she snagged what looked like a good deal through a Miami-Dade County foreclosure court auction: a four-bedroom house in Cutler Bay, with a swimming pool, for about $95,000.
But when her husband drove by the next day to check on the property, he saw "someone cleaning the pool, a lawn service cutting the grass and a note it was being tented for termites," said Oster, a Miami resident who has been in real estate for 15 years.
It turns out the house she thought she had purchased had been sold in a short sale the week before to someone else -- Osberto Jimenez, a 40-year-old truck driver. The law firm handling the foreclosure for the lender mishandled the paperwork and never canceled the auction sale.
"So we both own the same house and I'm frustrated as hell," Oster said. "Someone screwed up."
New attorneys representing CitiMortgage say that "someone" was David Stern's beleaguered law office, which originally represented the lender. Citi ultimately pulled the case from Stern's offices and gave it to Shapiro and Fishman, another large South Florida foreclosure firm that represents banks and loan servicers.
Both law offices, along with two others, are under investigation by the Florida Attorney General. They're accused of engaging in shoddy practices, including fabricating documents. Shapiro and Fishman has defended its practices and said it did nothing wrong. Jeffrey Tew, the attorney representing Stern, declined to comment.
Stern, who at one point claimed he processed 20 percent of the state's foreclosures through a staff of more than 1,000, has been forced to lay off the vast majority of his employees as his biggest clients continue to abandon him. Citi spokesman Mark Rodgers declined to comment specifically on the Cutler Bay double sale, but said the company stopped referring new foreclosures to Stern in September and now has removed all of its business from the firm.
Attorneys general in 50 states continue to investigate reports of servicers and foreclosure firms like Stern's "robo-signing" hundreds of thousands of affidavits without reviewing them.
In the situation with the Cutler Bay house, attorney Leora B. Freire, with Shapiro and Fishman, said Stern's office didn't notify the courts to take the house out of the foreclosure auction after the short sale had been processed.
Oster and Citi reached an agreement last week, Freire said, vacating Oster's sale, which allows Jimenez to keep the house. Oster said she would be refunded her money, paid some interest, and have her legal fees covered.
Documents show Oster bought the property for cash on Oct. 6 and received a certificate of title. Seven days earlier, Jimenez executed a warranty deed and took out a $123,000 mortgage in a short sale approved by CitiMortgage and the previous owners.
The tsunami of negative news about Stern's operation had Oster fearing she never would see her money again. She said she contacted the office numerous times for more than a month, but attorneys either would not return her calls or couldn't tell her what had happened to her payment.
"I just wanted out because it was David Stern's firm," she said.
Mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, who comprised the majority of Stern's referrals, pulled all of their cases from the firm over the past two months. Shapiro and Fishman, however, remain on Fannie's referral list.
Darryl Wilson, a professor and real estate expert at Stetson University's College of Law, said that while selling the same house twice was "quite strange," it does happen -- and increasingly more so lately, as lenders, attorneys and the courts scramble to push a huge number of foreclosures through the pipeline.
While there is no specific statute addressing double sales, Wilson said basic common law suggests that the first person buying the property would have the first rights to it. But the outcome could vary according to the specifics in each case, Wilson said.
Jimenez, who came from Cuba five years ago, said he always assumed he would get to keep his home because he bought it first. He already has started renovating the kitchen and decorated the yard with holiday lights.
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/12/07/1960976/foreclosed-home-mistakenly-sold.html#ixzz17SKbOXR6
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