Houston, Texas-based Morgan Group closed on the land for its Flagler Village apartment project in Fort Lauderdale, with plans to break ground later this year.
An affiliate of Morgan paid about $16.5 million for the 3-acre site between Northeast Third and Fourth avenues along Northeast Fourth Street. There, Morgan will build a seven-story, 350-unit apartment building, Evan Schlecker, Morgan Group’s regional vice president of development, told The Real Deal. The amenity-heavy project will also include commercial space and parking, Schlecker said.
MSA Architects and landscape architect Architectural Alliance are designing the development, according to plans filed with the city last year.
County records show Morgan financed the deal with an $8.6 million mortgage from JPMorgan Chase. Putnam Realty Ltd. and 411 Partners, companies managed by Ron W. Feldman, sold the 14 parcels to 400 NE Third Avenue LLC. Per square foot, the deal breaks down to about $126. The sellers assembled the properties between 1986 and 2012.
It’s across the street from AMLI Flagler Village, an apartment complex at 440 Northeast Fourth Avenue.
Commercial activity has been heating up in Flagler Village, a roughly 300-acre neighborhood west of U.S. 1 in Fort Lauderdale. At a TRD panel on Thursday, Jaime Sturgis, sales director for Metro 1’s Broward office, said alternative forms of transportation have been key to the area’s success, including All Aboard Florida and the proposed Wave streetcar. “Transportation is the crutch we all lean on in the urban core,” he said on the panel. “As that gets better and we have alternative modes of transportation, we can build this density with 42 projects coming online [in Flagler Village], and with that comes all the creative retail.”
In July, the Related Group sold the Manor at Flagler Village, a 382-unit apartment and mixed-use development at 501 North Federal Highway, for about $150 million.
Morgan is working on two other projects in South Florida. The multifamily developer scored a $71 million construction loan for Pearl Midtown 29, a 20-story, 309-unit mixed-use apartment tower near Midtown Miami. The company is also building Pearl Dadeland, a 412-unit apartment building in Miami. That will open in June, Schlecker previously told TRD.