Lionstone Development leapt into the South Florida office feeding frenzy with a $16.8 million acquisition in Miami Gardens.
An affiliate of the Bal Harbour-based real estate investment firm acquired Commons Plaza, a newly renovated, three-story office building at 5901 Miami Gardens Drive, according to records. Lionstone, led by CEO Diego Lowenstein, paid $297 per square foot for the building.
The seller, an entity managed by Norberto Roman of Miami, sold the nearly 3-acre property for $12 million above its $4.8 million purchase in 2019, records show. The 56,601-square-foot building was completed in 2008.
Alex Zylberglait with Marcus & Millichap represented the seller and the buyer.
The deal did not include two out of 144 office units in Commons Plaza, and the building is 99 percent occupied by a mix of professional tenants, the release states. Commons Plaza also has a wait list of prospective tenants, reflecting strong demand for spaces in small and suburban office buildings, Zylberglait said in a statement.
South Florida is experiencing a flurry of office trades recently. This month, MHCommercial Real Estate Fund II and an unidentified partner paid $45.9 million for the Yamato Office Center, a two-building complex in Boca Raton.
In April, Valoro Capital picked up an office building in Miami’s Blue Lagoon neighborhood for $18 million; and Miami attorney Alex Hanna and his wife, Lizet Hanna, acquired an office building on Miami’s Flagler Street for $15 million.
The same month, Boca Raton-based CS Ventures paid $35 million for a pair of office buildings along Bankers Row in Palm Beach. And in Miami Beach, an entity tied to Boston-based The Davis Companies bought a four-story Class A office building for $52.3 million.
In Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties, rents and tenant demand tracked upward in the first quarter, according to a JLL report. The average asking rent in Miami-Dade hit $48.66 a square foot, representing a 10.2 percent jump compared to the same period last year. The county had a vacancy rate of 18.8 percent in the most recent quarter.
Average asking rents in Palm Beach County climbed 26.5 percent, year-over-year, to $53.47 a square foot, JLL found. The vacancy rate was 13.5 percent in the most recent quarter.