Last night the area Homeowners' Association had a really informative agenda, but only 50 or so residents were interested enough to attend (which is why this blog exists: for the lazy majority).
The HOA is doing some good work, but it's doing so with only 141 paid members (170 paid last year). In this writer's opinion the HOA dues should be lowered to $10 (instead of going up this year from $25 to $30). More members = more mandate, and with over $25,000 in the bank (representing 5 years' worth of accumulated collections), Carl Icahn [activist-investor] would be pounding the table for a special-dividend. I would agree, recommending (i) a decrease in dues to $10, with current paid members getting a 3-year membership in return for having already paid $30.
Other than some once-annual printing costs (which could probably be minimized if mailings were coordinated with e-mails and Nextdoor), the cost of refreshments at meetings (unnecessary - bottled water is evil!), there should be no cost to operating an HOA - the venues are donated without charge, and the membership and board are volunteers, so why the cash hoard? Maybe some of that money could be put toward beautification: "Lower the fees and plant some trees!"
But I digress. On to the substantive aspects of the meeting:
1. Interstate highway 95 construction goes on. After lobbying by residents (myself included) for years, the southbound off-ramp to Ives Dairy will (at last) be expanded from the 1-lane bottleneck in a few short weeks. Another lane is being added all the way from Ives Dairy to Hallandale Beach Blvd. (this will take longer), and in about one year (May 2015) a new "express lane" will be added, similar to the "pay lane" you see when driving south to Miami. Good news for drivers of hybrid and electric cars (who ride free), and good news for people with money.
2. Development
The most important information coming from the meeting concerned land development in our area. The most important concerned passenger rail and the potential for a new station. That is such a large topic it needs a separate post (to come).
Today's post examines the vacant parcels as they are today with a little history, and a little investigative journalism. To begin, let's take a look at the land, which is SOUTH of Ives Dairy, EAST of NE 26th Ave, West of West Dixie Highway, and NORTH of 195th Street:
The above image has been labelled to show who owns what. The northern-most labelled parcel is the future site of the Beacon Tower (see this earlier post for more details - in fact go and read that post right now).
Proceeding southward, the largest parcel follows, owned by "LG Aventura, LLC." This parcel is owned by Gables Residential, who were represented at the HOA meeting last night by Sheldon Powell, who explained that a rental community composed of townhomes and several hundred apartments are basically a done-deal as far as approvals from the County (no approval needed from local residents however, given that we are not a "city" with a "government").
South of that large parcel is where things get interesting, beginning with 19800 West Dixie Highway, a 122,068 sf parcel owned by “Eliahu Ben Shmuel Trust, and Daniel Mims Ben
Shmuel Trust.” The owner address is an
address in Tennessee, but Eliahu Ben-Shmuel is a businessman in his 70s living
in Golden Beach, who previously founded Swiss Watch International (a Florida-based
company that “designs and makes timepieces worldwide,” including counterfeiting
Seiko and Pulsar watches, according to this 2002 case). The most amazing thing about the case is that
you can make any money counterfeiting a crappy Pulsar watch! SWI was started by Eliahu (“Eli”) in 1995, but was later run
by his 3 sons Izac (42), Lior (40) and Shlomi (36) [source],
before being sold in late 2012. Hey: who
needs to be in the watch business when owning real estate can be so lucrative!
This parcel was purchased (together with
the others described below) for $3.4M in December 2012. With the potential to sell the land for mega bucks for use as a commuter rail station (hey! I told you to go and read this earlier post for more details already!), the Ben-Shmuels may well be the future Soffers of "West Aventura"! [the Soffers are the family that brought you the soon-to-be second largest mall in America - see earlier post here for more details].
19790 WDH is owned by March Property Acquisitions LLC. The 37,684sf parcel was bought in September
2013 for $1.25M. The uninformative name of the company suggests it is a limited-liability vehicle for another larger company to operate secretly - possibly one of the 2 hotels (yes, hotels) that are rumored to have development plans in the area (Hampton Inn or Holiday Inn Express).
Next to the south is 19770 owned, again, but the Ben-Shmuel trusts. This 54,014sf parcel was purchased (together
with other parcels) for $3.4M in December 2012.
Last comes 19680, a 49,223 sf parcel also owned by the Ben-Shmuel trusts, and part of the $3.4M deal in December 2012.
The parcels South of the above-described land have already
been developed. If you haven't driven by recently, you will be surprised to see several residential buildings that will be occupied very soon.
So now you have some idea of the parcels, their sizes, possible uses and ownership. So much has happened in this area already without any oversight or input, which is really a shame, and one of the reasons why this blog, nextdoor.com, and the HOA are necessary. So please keep reading, join Nextdoor [use this link], and join the HOA (complaining about the cost when you do).
Next up: Aventura's "Grand Central Station" with a pedestrian overpass to the Mall ... on OUR property? How nice for Aventura!
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