A Denver-based private equity player and its Miami partners have quietly redrawn the map of a Doral office campus, cashing out of two buildings while holding the center slice for housing. The strategy pairs a sale to a hometown buyer with a separate joint venture already turning the remaining structure into a 380-unit apartment community under Florida’s Live Local rules. For neighbors, it is one more sign that tired suburban offices near Miami International Airport are being traded in for badly needed housing as the market shifts underfoot.
Deal Details: What Changed Hands
The sellers, Denver-based Ascentris with Miami partners Highline Real Estate Capital and Square2 Capital, offloaded Westside Plaza I and Westside Plaza III, the four-story buildings at 8400 and 8200 NW 33rd Street, to Miami firm COFE Properties for roughly $63.3 million, according to The Real Deal. COFE financed the purchase with about $41.4 million from Ocean Bank and effectively paid around $242 per square foot for the pair, the outlet reports. Ascentris and its partners kept control of the middle asset, Westside Plaza II, carving off the rest of the campus as part of a larger repositioning play.
The Plan For The Middle Building
Westside Plaza II, at 8300 NW 33rd Street, changed hands in January to a joint venture between Ascentris and Dallas-based ZOM Living. The partnership plans to demolish the three-story office and replace it with Hazel Doral, a seven-story, 380-unit apartment community. To qualify under Florida’s Live Local framework, at least 40 percent of the units will be reserved for households earning up to 120 percent of the area median income, and the venture locked in a roughly $92.3 million construction loan from PNC Bank, according to Florida YIMBY. Construction kicked off earlier this year, with completion eyed for 2027, per local reporting.
Why Live Local Is Shaping Deals
Florida’s Live Local Act, signed in 2023, allows developers to increase height and density on commercial or industrial sites in exchange for reserving workforce-priced housing. The law generally requires that at least 40 percent of units be affordable to households earning up to 120 percent of area median income and throws in tax abatements plus streamlined approvals. Those incentives have sped up office-to-housing conversions across South Florida as landlords look for better uses of their capital, according to a policy analysis by Multi-Housing News. That toolkit is what made the Hazel Doral concept pencil out where a straight office strategy likely would not have cleared the bar.
How The Campus Got Here
Ascentris and its partners acquired the three-building Westside Plaza campus in 2021 and started a renovation program aimed at firming up leasing, according to the firms' announcement. Ascentris highlighted lobby, amenity and exterior upgrades, and the ownership group later pushed occupancy at Westside Plaza I and III from about 63 percent to roughly 98 percent before selling, The Real Deal reports. The reposition-and-sell playbook let the partners harvest value from two now-stabilized assets while chasing potentially higher returns on the redevelopment of the middle parcel.
What To Watch Next
In Doral, the deals highlight a larger reset in the western Miami-Dade office market, where investors are trimming stabilized office holdings and steering capital into multifamily or industrial projects as demand evolves. Industry outlets point to several nearby office campuses that are being reworked or replaced with other uses, a backdrop that informed the Westside Plaza trades and will influence future permitting and traffic debates as Hazel Doral comes out of the ground, according to local coverage by ConnectCRE. Residents can expect to see permit filings, demolition crews and then full-blown construction activity in the coming months as the development moves toward delivery.
