Woodfield Buys Fort Lauderdale Dev Site From Kushner, Aimco
From left: Kushner Companies’ Nicole Kushner Meyer, Aimco’s Wes Powell, Kushner Companies’ Charles Kushner (sellers), Woodfield Development’s Todd Jacobus and Greg Bonifield (buyers) along with a rendering of the planned multifamily tower at 520 West Broward Boulevard (Getty, Woodfield Development, LinkedIn/Nicole Kushner Meyer, Kushner Companies, Spina O’Rourke + Partners)
Kushner Companies and Aimco sold a piece of their three-lot development assemblage near downtown Fort Lauderdale’s Brightline station.
Woodfield Development paid $18.3 million for the 0.8-acre site at 520 West Broward Boulevard, with plans to build a 41-story multifamily tower, according to records. The buyer took out a $9.1 million loan tied to the property from New York-based Maxim Capital Group.
Don Ginsburg and Michael Lewin of Katalyst Real Estate represented the sellers. CityLights Real Estate represented the buyer.
Kushner and Aimco still are moving ahead with their bet on the area. The pair plans to joint venture on two projects on nearby sites at 200 and 300 West Broward Boulevard.
Kushner — led by Charles Kushner, his daughter Nicole Kushner Meyer, and Laurent Morali — set its sights on the assemblage in 2019 when it put it under contract, marking the firm’s first Fort Lauderdale purchase. By January of this year, Kushner had secured a key zoning approval and teamed up with Aimco on the development, with the two paying $49 million for the three-lot assemblage.
The pair had planned to develop all three sites but then “received a strong offer” from Woodfield for the 520 West Broward Boulevard property, said Michael Sommer, EVP of development and construction at Kushner.
The projects on “all three parcels were designed [independently] from one another to stand on their own, but to complement each other,” Sommer said.
On its property, Woodfield wants to build a 365-unit apartment building with 2,500 square feet of commercial space and a 444-car garage, according to May filings to the city.
Kushner and Aimco have city approval for a 48-story building with 933 units at the 2.3-acre site at 300 West Broward Boulevard, with plans to start construction early next year. The two developers are working to “perfect” their plan for the 200 West Broward Boulevard site, Sommer said.
Woodfield was founded in 2005 and originally focused on development in the Carolinas and Washington, D.C., but has expanded elsewhere since then, according to its website.
New York-based Kushner and Denver-based Aimco have also been expanding in South Florida in recent months.
This year, Kushner partnered with Immocorp Capital on the apartment portion of a mixed-use project at 19199 Northwest 27th Avenue in Miami Gardens, near Stephen Ross’ Related Companies’ Hard Rock Stadium.
In Miami’s Edgewater neighborhood, Kushner Companies and PTM Partners want to build a three-tower complex with roughly 1,300 apartments at 1900 and 2000 Biscayne Boulevard.
Aimco, led by Wes Powell, also has been betting on Edgewater. The firm owns the Hamilton on the Bay apartment building, where Aimco canceled leases after its $90 million purchase of the property in 2020. It also owns a mixed-use development site near the Hamilton.
In Fort Lauderdale’s Flagler Village, Aimco paid $100 million in three deals this year for a 9-acre assemblage that allows for a 3 million-square-foot project with up to 1,500 units, more than 300 hotel keys, and more than 100,000 square feet of retail.
