Tall Tower Tussles
South Florida’s got an affordable housing shortage. And why wouldn’t it?
An unprecedented migration of wealth and business has flowed into the state, sending demand for homes and rentals soaring — as well as prices. Developers are exuberant, building ever more lavish and pricey units to capture this new, well-heeled consumer.
So how do you entice construction of housing that’s reasonably priced for those who are getting priced out?
With a bit of leverage and a whole lot of incentives. Florida last year approved the Live Local Act, which promised to ease the burden of two things builders hate: taxes and zoning restrictions.
Developers are now allowed to pitch ultra-tall projects that bypass local limits on building heights— so long as they designate 40% of their project’s units as “affordable” to people of certain income thresholds.
That’s unleashed a flood of proposals for income-restricted, or “workforce,” housing. But it’s also drawn the ire of local officials who aren’t pleased with the unusually tall tower plans cropping up in their towns, which state law declares must be approved.
Now, legislators are looking to change the law, less than one year since it was enacted, and before almost any proposed project has gotten under way.
This week, we look look at the highs and lows of Florida’s attempt to build more reasonably priced rental housing.
Asi Cymbal didn’t intend to build workforce housing when he broke ground on a luxury apartment community in Miami Gardens.
Halfway through construction, things changed.
The Live Local Act was signed into law while his firm, Cymbal DLT, was underway on the 341-unit rental development, called Laguna Gardens. And that new law dangled a perk that was hard to ignore: a 70% property tax reduction for any portion of the project designated as “affordable,” Cymbal said.
So Cymbal DLT went all-in — and declared every single apartment as such, with plans to lease them at below-market rates.
“Nothing’s changed with the project other than the rents,” Cymbal said of the low-rise development. “And that decision was made because of the financial incentive that was provided.”
Rents at Laguna Gardens—where amenities include a lap pool, a meditation garden and a “metaverse room” — now start at $2,000 for a one-bedroom, instead of $2,300 as originally planned, he said. That makes them accessible to tenants who earn up to 120% of the area’s median income — or $86,760 for a single-person household, according to state guidelines.
”Attainable luxury housing” is what Cymbal now calls it: “That’s housing that our hometown heroes can afford —our local police officers, teachers and nurses,” he said.
Cymbal is looking to retroactively apply the Live Local law to his other projects, including a rental community in Dania Beach that’s been open for over a year. He’s considering placing rent restrictions on 71 units there, the minimum required by law, as a way of realizing property tax deductions.
And he’s exploring doing the same within the $1.5 billion waterfront hotel and restaurant district he’s planning in Fort Lauderdale. There, the 71 rent- restricted units could be nestled among luxury condos in a neighborhood that will also offer a yacht valet, he said.
For now, Laguna Gardens is among the first projects in Florida to welcome middle-income tenants under the new law. Move-ins start in March.
“We’re certainly the first to implement it, in fact,” Cymbal said.
Applying the Live Local Act hasn’t been easy for most anyone else. Developers across the state have filed plans for tall towers, with affordable units, and they’re getting a hefty serving of backlash in return.
“I have not seen a single project being approved under Live Local in the state of Florida,” land use attorney Keith Poliakoff said in an interview this week. “I have only seen pushback, by every municipality across the board, to prohibit its implementation.”
