Newgard Development Group’s Centro, the latest downtown Miami residential building to debut without parking, is ready for move-ins.
The developer just announced that its 36-story tower has received a temporary certificate of occupancy from Miami-Dade County, signaling that the building has been completed after roughly two-and-a-half years of construction.
Buyers of the tower’s 352 loft-style units can now begin moving in, according to Newgard, and purchases should begin closing within the next week.
Roughly 90 percent of the building is sold out, with remaining units ranging in price from the mid $300,000s to $550,000. Condos at Centro come in one-, two- and three-bedroom floor plans measuring as small as 500 square feet and maxing out at 1,200 square feet.
Centro’s amenities are located on its top two floors. The building has a rooftop pool, health club and spa, two lounges for residents, plus a 24-hour reception desk.
As Newgard’s Managing Director Harvey Hernandez has told The Real Deal in the past, Centro was designed to tap demand for urban living in the downtown area.
The developer took full advantage of Centro’s proximity to a Metromover station, using a 100 percent parking waiver under the Miami 21 zoning code to eliminate the need for a parking podium.
With the price of building parking sometimes reaching $30,000 per spot, that meant Hernandez was able to dramatically reduce development costs — and squeeze more sellable square footage into the project, as well.
The target demographic: young professionals or single people who don’t mind giving up their cars and using public transportation like the Metromover to get around.
Centro is part of a growing trend among developers who want to ditch parking, both for the attractive cost savings and to sell the dream of a “work, live, play” lifestyle. So far, only a handful of such buildings exist in the urban core: Loft 1, Loft 2 and myBrickell, all of which were built by the Related Group.
The movement is not without its critics, who say Miami’s notorious car dependency will have buyers turn their noses up at a parking-less building. Plus, as Hernandez pointed out to TRD earlier this year, buyers in luxury buildings often demand spaces for their cars.