Downtown Land Deals Sizzle as Per-Acre Prices Hit Near Record

In the most recent activity, Palm Beach Land Trust LLC principal David Barley made a $3-million profit for his associates in 90 days. Three months ago, Barley bought a prime parcel at Livingston Street and Garland Avenue from entrepreneur Bob Stine's Star S Properties for $7.75 million or $2.62 million per acre ($60.10 per sf). The developer then sold the corner to Orlando Land Trust LLC Feb. 24 for $10.75 million or $3.63 million per acre ($83.37 per sf).

The $3.63-million-per-acre price is the second highest on record, according to Globest.com research. The highest recorded per-acre price is the $4.72 million ($108.26 per sf) that Orlando developer Cameron Kuhn paid in November 2003 to the locally based Tavistock Group for the 2.29-acre Jaymont Block Downtown, as GlobeSt.com previously reported.

Barley tells GlobeSt.com he initially purchased the 2.96-acre parcel "to protect my interests" in the $387-million, mixed-use 400 North Orange Project. His associates plan to start developing the project at year's end on a 5.6-acre parcel at Livingston Avenue and North Orange Avenue, as GlobeSt.com previously reported. Barley's associates paid Columbus, OH developer Ronald A. Pizzuti $17.1 million, or $3 million per acre (70 cents per sf), for the tract.

"I had heard this other group [Orlando Land Trust LLC] was interested in [buying] the corner and have made an arrangement with them that will not impinge on the integrity" of the 400 North Orange project. "When you are doing a major project [such as 400 North Orange], you need to protect the project by controlling the immediate area around the venture," Barley says. "That was the prime purpose in buying the 2.96 acres in the first place."

A local bar called 8 Seconds currently operates on the site. Barley says "the only one making any money on that corner's real estate until we came along was the hot dog vendor…and he'll probably continue to do so for quite awhile." The developers of record for 400 North Orange are Miami-based Global Group Investment Inc. of Miami and Fort Lauderdale-based Falcone Group. Barley represents them in Orlando.

Orlando Land Trust principals were not identified in the newest Downtown Barley deal. However, the Florida Department of Corporations lists Yizhak Toledano of Hollywood, FL as the registered agent and manager of Orlando Land Trust LLC. Toledano made news in Orlando's commercial real estate circles in 2002 when his Toledano Holdings bought the abandoned five-acre, five-building Ramada Inn-Citrus Sun Club, 25 miles west of Downtown Orlando in Clermont.

Toledano Holdings paid $350,000, or $70,000 per acre, for the 176-unit apartment property that opened as a hotel and nightclub in 1973. The venture closed in 1989 after the former owners filed for Chapter 11 protection under the US Bankruptcy Code, as GlobeSt.com previously reported.

Three blocks from Barley's deal, Central Associates No. 1, comprised of former Maitland developer Pat Morley and associates who developed Century Plaza Downtown 20 years ago, sold a 1.88-acre parcel on the northeast corner of Garland Avenue and Washington Street to Jain Manohar Trustee for $4.4 million or $2.34 million per acre ($53.72 per sf).

Charles J. Mitchell, a principal at locally based First Capital Property Group; CB Richard Ellis Inc. vice president Ronald J. Rogg; and former Orange County commission chairman and broker Robert Freeman put the 1.88-acre deal together at 99 N. Garland Ave. Mitchell tells GlobeSt.com the property was on the market for six months. The deal took another two months to complete.

Freeman provided the buyer. "I had taken care of the property [drive-in teller lease] since my Morley days in the early 1990s," Mitchell tells GlobeSt.com.

In a third profitable land deal, Orange County Mayor Rich Crotty acknowledged this week he made $112,000 on a $100,000 investment with Orlando broker Daryl Carter on a 90-acre tract and warehouse in Boynton Beach.

Carter's company, Boynton Office Owners LLC paid $21.8 million, or $242,222 per acre ($5.56 per sf), for the property Sept. 23, 2002, as GlobeSt.com previously reported. In separate deals, a year later, Carter's company sold the property for a total $37.7 million or $418,888 per acre ($9.62 per sf). Crotty was paid $212,141 for his share in the deal.