Institutional Money Paid About $389,000 a Door in Davie and $321 a Foot in Palm Beach Gardens This Week

Two institutional trades closed the week in South Florida and both are useful as price signals. A Goldman Sachs affiliate paid roughly $154.5 million for Modera Academical Village I, a 397-unit apartment property at 3440 Southwest 76th Terrace in Davie, buying from Boca Raton-based Mill Creek Residential. Separately, Boston-based Mount Vernon Co. paid $66.85 million for Promenade Plaza, a 207,877-square-foot retail center in Palm Beach Gardens, which works out to $321.58 per square foot, per Commercial Real Estate Direct.

About that Davie price

The outlets do not agree. Bisnow's September 14 headline says $154 million. The Real Deal's article text says $154.5 million, and The Real Deal's own deals roundup headline says $155 million. Call it roughly $154.5 million and do not quote a precise figure as settled fact. The Real Deal reported the property as an eight-story building on 3.1 acres completed by Mill Creek last year, and said Mill Creek and FCP bought the land in 2022 with plans for a total of 793 units next to Nova Southeastern University. Those details are single-sourced. The buyer, the property and a price in the $154 million to $155 million band are corroborated across outlets.

And the retail deal

Commercial Real Estate Direct confirmed Mount Vernon Co. as the buyer, the 207,877-square-foot size, the $66.85 million price and the $321.58 per square foot figure. The Real Deal's September 14 deals roundup adds Nuveen Real Estate as the seller, JLL Capital Markets as the broker and Publix as the anchor. Those three details come from that outlet only, so hold them loosely until a second source carries them.

My read

Roughly $389,000 a door for suburban Broward apartments is the most useful number in this week's news if you own rental property anywhere in South Florida. Goldman is not buying a narrative at that basis. It is underwriting continued rent growth in a submarket next to a university, and a price per unit like that only pencils if the buyer believes rents keep climbing for years. If you own small multifamily and you have been told the rental market softened, this is the counterweight, and it is the environment you would be selling into. On the retail side, $321 a foot for grocery-anchored space tells you the safest income asset in the region is still clearing at a full number with out-of-state institutional capital. That does not mean your strip center is worth $321 a foot. It means the category is liquid. What decides your number is the rent roll, the anchor's remaining lease term and the renewal options, and I would want all three in front of me before applying anybody else's comp to your property.