What could be missing from a $4 billion master-planned community whose blueprint already includes luxury housing, retail shops, green spaces and even a 7-acre artificial lagoon? For SoLé Mia developers LeFrak and Turnberry, the answer was rather straightforward: health care.
The idea fell into their laps when University of Miami Health System – UHealth for short – went searching for a site to accommodate its new world-class medical center three years ago. After a COVID-induced hiatus, the trio started the ball rolling on their plan early last month.
(Courtesy of LeFrak)
North Miami Councilwoman Mary Estimé-Irvin, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava and North Miami Councilman Scott Galvin at the Sept. 9 groundbreaking event.
UHealth at SoLé Mia is a 363,000-square-foot ambulatory site to be built over 10 acres of a larger, mixed-use development east of Biscayne Boulevard between 138th and 151st streets. Soon to be UHealth’s largest outpatient facility, the strategically located seven-story building will offer residents of northeast Miami-Dade County and south Broward access to academic medicine focused on healing, wellness and prevention.
Construction for the development broke ground last month and is slated for completion in 2025. With it will come an array of specialized services that stand to benefit both the residents of SoLé Mia and its encompassing city.
Medical Desert
(LeFrak)
Richard LeFrak, CEO & Chair of LeFrak
Having state-of-the-art health care just a short walk away from one’s front doorstep is no small offering. UHealth’s latest venture jacks up the demand and marketability for SoLé Mia’s housing units, but it also fills a niche that’s much needed in North Miami.
Dipen Parekh, UHealth’s chief operating officer, says the targeted community is underserved as far as his organization’s unique services go. For residents of northeast Miami-Dade, the closest of the medical system’s facilities is the UHealth Tower in Allapattah, approximately 11 miles away from the new site.
With major locations in Doral, Palmetto Bay, Coral Gables, Kendall and Flagami, UHealth’s resources are otherwise spread throughout the county.
“There’s so much demand from our population to get access to the only academic health system in South Florida that not just takes exemplary care of their patients, but also provides alternative and innovative therapies and discoveries that no one else does,” Parekh said.
(Gio Alma)
Turnberry CEO Jackie Soffer
UHealth at SoLé Mia will include cancer specialists from Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, the only cancer center in South Florida recognized by the National Cancer Institute. It will also offer advanced vision care from Bascom Palmer Eye Institute – ranked No. 1 in the country – and urological treatments from the Desai Sethi Urology Institute.
Patients will have access to nationally ranked neurology and neurosurgery programs, and be offered care in the fields of cardiology, endocrinology, otolaryngology, gastroenterology, dermatology, physical rehabilitation and more.
To be clear, the new medical center is not a hospital. Patients in need of an emergency room will still have to make the trip to Jackson North Medical Center – roughly five to six miles from North Miami, and possibly a 25-minute drive during peak traffic hours – or HCA Florida Aventura Hospital, which is further still.
Yet the expected benefits of SoLé Mia’s latest addition are manifold. And in a city doing its best to spur development and profits, a big name like UHealth is enough to induce excitement.
Bringing in the Money
If SoLé Mia is a leading project in the race to revitalize North Miami, then UHealth might just be its secret weapon.
(Courtesy of University of Miami)
The University of Miami Health System has partnered with luxury developers LeFrak and Turnberry to build a medical center in northeast Miami-Dade County.
“Having ambulatory medicine with so many specialties under one roof creates greater resilience and helps make North Miami an even more desirable destination,” said Jackie Soffer, CEO and chair of Turnberry Associates. “SoLé Mia has been a driver for a renaissance in North Miami, and world-class health care is one of the elements that makes communities thrive.”
The hundreds of staff members, patients and visitors brought in by the medical facility will increase foot traffic throughout the city and generate additional tax dollars, but it’ll also garner some highly welcomed attention.
For city Councilmember Scott Galvin, sharing a home with UHealth is akin to having a celebrity in attendance at your local party.
(VillaLaguna.com)
Villa Laguna is the second residential development in the SoLé Mia mixed-use community.
“Beyond the financial benefits of what tax revenue it’s going to end up bringing, having them there, having them in the city is really a feather in our cap,” said Galvin, who attended a groundbreaking ceremony for the project Sept. 9.
Oleta Partners, the joint venture between LeFrak and Turnberry, expects a high return of investment on the medical center as well. SoLé Mia’s myriad restaurants and retail shops will provide lunch bites and pastimes just a walk away for medical personnel and patients alike. On the other end, it’s profit all the way through for developers.
“From our point of view, UHealth’s state of the art medical facility will further activate and anchor our community by bringing jobs, visitors and housing demand to our project while also supporting our planned restaurants and other retail offerings during the day,” said Richard LeFrak, chairman and CEO of the company that bears his name.
(Turnberry Associates/SoLé Mia)
Villa SoLé is SoLé Mia’s most recently completed residential tower.
LeFrak, a multibillionaire in his own right, is the son of real estate tycoon Samuel LeFrak, who developed LeFrak City in Queens, N.Y., for the postwar middle classes as Fred Trump was building Trump Village in the neighboring borough of Brooklyn.
From 1986, LeFrak revamped the dingy Jersey City, N.J., skyline into the gleaming 600-acre Newport mixed-use development, featuring upper- to mid-level rentals and creating a template to transform the SoLé Mia site from the landfill it once was.
“Lots of people tried to do something with this property, but you know who actually pulled it off?” he said after the groundbreaking, pointing at himself and smiling. “I’m a magician. I turn sh-t into paradise. I’ve been telling people this for years.”
More in Store
(ShorelineSoleMia.com)
The East and West Towers of the Shoreline overlook SoLé Mia’s 7-acre lagoon.
SoLé Mia is seven years into a 15-year development plan that is reconstructing the 184-acre property adjacent to
Florida International University’s Biscayne Bay Campus. Upon completion, the entire project will contain more than 4,000 residential units and more than 500,000 square feet of retail and office space.
So far, 800 rental units have been built at the Shoreline, Villa Laguna and the newest development, Villa Solé, which is about to take on its first rentals.
The UHealth medical center’s opening in 2025 will coincide with the completion of SoLé Mia’s next 30-story residential tower, 2400 Laguna Circle. Turnberry is also beginning to lease out the 33-story One Park Towers, SoLé Mia’s first condo development with 303 residencies, to be completed in 2026.
(Mark Sell for Biscayne Times)
Developer Richard LeFrak reviews remarks as he, Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava and North Miami Mayor Philippe Bien-Aime prepare to speak in a packed tent before the UHealth groundbreaking.
Prices for the condos start at $500,000 and reach above $3 million, while rental units within the first two developments are being leased for approximately $2,500 a month or higher.
Although SoLé Mia’s housing and exclusive parks may be left largely inaccessible to current residents of North Miami, whose median household income doesn’t exceed $44,000, Parekh and the UHealth team are equally committed to all patients despite wealth or ZIP code.
“We’re going to take care of everyone,” Parekh said. “We want to make sure that we make it easier for patients who have been out of their means to travel all the way from North Miami to access our facilities. Now we’ll be very close to them.”
Reporting from Mark Sell contributed to this story.
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(TurnberryOneParkTower.com)
One Park Towers is a 33-story condo development from Turnberry with 303 residencies to be completed in 2026.
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(TurnberryOneParkTower.com)
Prices for condos at One Park Towers start at $500,000 and reach above $3 million.
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(Courtesy of University of Miami)
UHealth’s newest and largest outpatient facility will be part of the 184-acre mixed-use community known as SoLé Mia.
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(Courtesy of University of Miami)
A rendering of the interior of UHealth’s newest medical facility.
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(Courtesy of University of Miami)
UHealth at SoLé Mia will feature a 363,000 square-foot medical facility with an adjoining parking garage to be built over 10 acres.
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(Courtesy of LeFrak)
Dipen Parekh (R), University of Miami Health System’s chief operating officer, speaks at a Sept. 9 groundbreaking ceremony, joined at the podium by Henri Ford, dean and chief academic officer of the Miller School of Medicine.