DOWNTOWN AT THE GARDENS SELLS FOR $142 MILLION
OK this is a great real estate story, what we in the business refer to as a home run. It begins with the Berman family, a super nice bunch from Maryland. They are fabulously rich, owning properties and businesses all over the place. They fell into this property, Downtown at the Gardens, which was a more or less failed lifestyle project off of PGA Blvd. in Palm Beach Gardens. They bought it for a song, for $38 million out of foreclosure, as it sold for $200 million in 2007. The property has a terrible design, with the anchor tenants on the outside and all the small shop tenants inside with no anchor tenants to draw people to them. The restaurants and anchor tenants did OK and the small retailers struggled. The first thing the Bermans did was put in a cool carousel to try to draw in children and families, which is exactly who lives in this area. Then through their own hard work, being on site and through shrewd deal making they leased it to almost full capacity. Sure enough the market turned around during all of this and low and behold they just sold it for $142 million dollars just 5 years after buying it for $38 million. This is a classic story of buying at a low point in the market and selling at a high point. And these are truly good people and I couldn’t be happier for them, not that they need the money! Congrats to the Berman family and I hope that they buy another property here in South Florida soon so I can see them again. As nice as they are, they have been adverse to fishing but I will keep trying. As always thanks for reading and have a great day.
Five years after foreclosure, Downtown at Gardens fetches $142 million
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