Michael Stern’s JDS Development scored a $137 million construction loan for a South Beach condo project known as Monad Terrace, in what appears to be the largest financing deal in Miami’s market in nearly a year.
Madison Realty Capital, a New York-based real estate investor and lender, provided the financing for the 59-unit, Jean Nouvel-designed project at 1300 Monad Terrace. The loan isn’t contingent upon any sales thresholds.
Stern and his partners New Valley, Ackerman Development and Mink Development, launched sales in February 2017. Construction is expected to go vertical in a couple of weeks and be completed by the fall of next year, Stern said.
“Large construction loans in Florida right now are few and far between and this speaks to the quality of the project and the vision of the lender,” he added.
It’s the first construction loan north of $100 million for a Miami-Dade condo project to close this year. In September, Terra and its partners upped their financing for Eighty Seven Park in Miami Beach to $155 million. In June, Turnberry Associates secured a $259 million construction loan for Turnberry Ocean Club Residences, a luxury condo tower in Sunny Isles Beach.
The construction financing was reported earlier Tuesday by Bloomberg.
Monad Terrace made headlines last year when its previous lender, EO Monad Terrace, filed a foreclosure lawsuit in May 2017 against ownership for allegedly failing to pay the $45.8 million mortgage principal on the property. A judge dismissed the suit in October, court records show.
According to property records, the partners spent more than $51 million assembling the 14-parcel development site between 2015 and 2016.
Nouvel, a Pritzker Prize-winning architect, designed Monad Terrace with Kobi Karp Architecture and Interior Design. Units range from about 1,500 square feet to 5,350 square feet. Prices start at $1.7 million, and sales are averaging nearly $2,000 per square foot, according to Jay Parker, CEO of Douglas Elliman Florida, which is handling sales. In South Beach, condo sales fell 11 percent year-over-year in the first quarter, according to Miller Samuel, with buyers getting discounts averaging 10.4 percent.
The building will feature climbing gardens, reflecting pools and large terraces overlooking the bay.
Separately, JDS and Chetrit Group are seeking $130 million in EB-5 financing for their 10-acre Miami River project. When completed, the development is slated to hold nearly 1,700 units, 330 hotel rooms and over 250,000 square feet of retail space. George Washington Immigration Group was tapped to raise the capital.