Cushman & Wakefield’s Virgilio Fernandez Represents Buyer In $22M Off-Market Acquisition

Cushman & Wakefield represented AvalonBay Communities, one of the nation’s largest publicly traded apartment REITs, in the acquisition of a full city block development site in downtown South Miami.

AvalonBay acquired the approximately 1.18-acre site from longtime owner Robins Plaza, LLC for a base purchase price of $22 million in an off-market transaction.

Cushman & Wakefield’s Virgilio Fernandez represented AvalonBay Communities in the transaction.

The acquisition clears the way for AvalonBay’s second project in the City of South Miami, Avalon South Miami II, a planned 16-story mixed-use community with 251 apartments ranging from studios to three-bedroom units, approximately 17,713 square feet of highly desirable ground-floor commercial space, a sixth-floor pool, a rooftop lounge and 394 parking spaces. The project was designed by Coral Gables-based Corwil Architects. At approximately $90,000 per unit, the site’s per-unit pricing is the highest ever paid for a South Miami development site.

Additionally, the site is one of the few remaining full-block development sites in downtown South Miami and offers 300 feet of frontage on U.S. 1 as well as access to the South Miami Metrorail station, the University of Miami and the Shops at Sunset Place.

In a notable nod to the city’s character, the historic corner building at 5900-5904 Sunset Drive was excluded from the sale and will be retained and renovated by the seller to become the new home of the beloved Deli Lane Café & Sunset Tavern.

“This was one of the last true full-block development opportunities in downtown South Miami, and it sits in exactly the kind of transit-oriented, walkable location institutional capital currently seeks,” said Fernandez, Cushman & Wakefield Managing Director. “What makes this deal special is that growth and preservation went hand in hand. The structure kept a cherished local institution, the Deli Lane Café & Sunset Tavern, in place while delivering 251 new homes adjacent to one of the region’s best transit nodes.”

The sale comes amid a wave of transformative redevelopment in South Miami. In October 2024, the City Commission unanimously approved the redevelopment of the nearby Shops at Sunset Place into a 1.47-million-square-foot urban village with 1,513 residences, a 287-key hotel, a 1,300-seat theater and towers rising as high as 33 stories, designed by London-based Heatherwick Studio. The city also advanced a roughly $309-million public-private redevelopment that would replace City Hall and the police station with two 15-story towers and approximately 670 apartments. Together with AvalonBay’s acquisition, these projects signal a decisive shift toward higher-density, transit-oriented growth along the U.S. 1 and Metrorail corridor.