January 27, 2016 The Skanner Page 9
News
As wealthy Brazilians Snap up Miami Real Estate, Few Benefit
Josh Boak, Jennifer Kay
Associated Press
MIAMI — Facing a tee-
tering economy at home,
wealthy Brazilians have
been pouring money into
what they increasingly
see as the safest place to
invest: South Florida real
estate.
So are Argentinians,
Colombians, Mexicans,
Venezuelans, French and
Turks — almost anyone
with money to shelter,
a direct flight to Miami
and a shaky economy to
flee.
Their cash has helped
drive the latest twist in
Miami’s ever-evolving
“
undergone a more dras-
tic face-lift from foreign
cash in the past decade:
Luxury condo towers
and swanky retailers
crowd a downtown once
marred by empty lots.
And almost no develop-
er expects the demand to
stop.
Yet Miamians as a
whole have scarcely
benefited from the glitz.
Wages have actually
dropped for Miami work-
ers in the past year. Area
unemployment tops the
national average. Mi-
ami contains the largest
share of renters in the
country who devote over
30 percent of their pay to
Murray, associate direc-
tor of Florida Interna-
tional University’s Met-
ropolitan Center. “That
impacts local businesses,
and we’re losing oppor-
tunities to create year-
round housing for our
workers. They’re moving
out.”
But with its glamorous
locale and easy access,
Miami real estate offers
an asset that’s appre-
ciating at a time when
other investments have
shrunk or turned fright-
eningly volatile. That’s
despite being on a stretch
of land prone to natural
disasters.
“All of the insecurity
We’re not seeing the benefits of that income
being disposed of in the local economy. That
impacts local businesses, and we’re losing op-
portunities to create year-round housing for
our workers. They’re moving out
transformation — from
a 19th century rail stop
to a tourist-and-retiree
hub to a haven for Cuban
refugees to now a harbor
for global investors. No
American skyline has
housing — the level the
government deems bur-
densome.
“We’re not seeing the
benefits of that income
being disposed of in the
local economy,” said Ned
around the rest of the
world only reminds peo-
ple how important it is to
have assets in the United
States,” said Alicia Cer-
vera Lamadrid, a devel-
oper who is leading sales
AP PHOTO/WILFREDO LEE, FILE
Amid real estate boom, locals struggle with low wages, high unemployment and fewer affordable rentals
In this Oct. 30, 2015, file photo, a pedestrian walks past a Fendi store in the Miami Design District in Miami.
A proliferation of luxury stores in Miami is serving wealthy Latin Americans fleeing financial and political
turmoil in their countries.
efforts for the planned
57-story Elysee, with
condo units starting at
$1.65 million and person-
al wine storage available
for residents.
No fewer than 126
residential towers are
planned for construction
in South Florida. One
sign of the scale of wealth
from abroad is that the
majority of foreign pur-
chases are being funded
with cash, not debt.
Last year, foreigners
spent $6.1 billion on Mi-
ami-area real estate — 36
percent of all such in-
vestment, according to
the Miami Association of
Realtors. Nationally, for-
eigners account for just
8 percent of sales.
The influx has been
sudden enough that the
federal government has
announced plans to mon-
itor home purchases ex-
ceeding $3 million in Mi-
ami and New York City.
Starting in March, the
government will tempo-
rarily require title com-
panies to identify buyers
of property. Authorities
have grown concerned
that money launderers
may be using anony-
mous holding companies
to stash money in high-
end real estate.
The average luxury
condo price in Miami
Beach has surged 35 per-
cent from a year ago to
$3.7 million, according to
the real estate brokerage
Douglas Elliman.
See MIAMI on page 10
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