Owners at the Ritz-Carlton Tower Residences in Coconut Grove say chunks of concrete have fallen from their building onto the pool deck and street, an oil leak has damaged the garage roof, and post-tension cables inside the parking structure have broken — and now they are suing to force repairs. The Tower Residences Condominium Association filed a complaint in Miami-Dade Circuit Court on August 14 against former owner Hersha Hospitality Trust and current owner Gencom, the Miami-based company that redeveloped and once ran the property.
The lawsuit, first reported by The Real Deal, describes a 21-story tower at 3400 Southwest 27th Avenue in dangerous disrepair after years of neglect. The association represents owners at the 129-unit building, where condos have traded for over $1 million, and it is asking the court to force Gencom to complete repairs while also seeking reimbursement from both companies for higher costs, the scope of the damage, and lost property values. The publication reports that the City of Miami issued a violation notice on the property in February 2025, and that conditions have only worsened since then.
Cracked Concrete, Leaking Balconies, and a Garage in Trouble
According to the complaint, a 25-year recertification report on the building — completed in 2001 and now subject to Florida's post-Surfside structural safety mandates — outlined cracks in the stucco and water seepage into balcony slabs. The Real Deal reports that balcony repair work stalled after deeper problems surfaced, and that Hersha had worked to repair only two test balconies before the broader issues emerged. Building managers have since closed part of the pool deck and a staircase to protect residents and visitors, per the outlet's reporting.
The garage has fared no better. The complaint alleges damage from a leaking generator oil on the garage roof and broken post-tension cables inside the structure — the kind of internal reinforcement that helps hold a concrete garage together. Repairs across the property are estimated to cost between $30 million and $40 million, and the association says it has already paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in the meantime, with unit owners responsible for about 70 percent of the repair costs under the current allocation.
Yearslong Frustration Boils Over Into Litigation
In an August email to condo owners, Tower Residences Director Murat Kiral wrote that the building owner failed to perform required maintenance for over eight years, making litigation necessary to secure an execution plan and resolve how costs get divided, according to Coconut Grove Spotlight. Neither Gencom nor Hersha returned The Real Deal's requests for comment on the lawsuit.
The dispute traces back through a complicated corporate history. Gencom sold a majority stake in the hotel portion of the property to Hersha in 2017 for $24.63 million, then reacquired majority ownership in December 2025 with financing from Banco Inbursa, according to Hotel Investment Today. Coconut Grove Spotlight's reporting places that sale within Hersha's broader retreat from the hospitality business, part of a six-property, $216 million divestment as the trust shed hotel assets. The complex itself is split into two distinct 21-story towers, and the separate condominium association tied to the 115-room hotel building is not a party to the lawsuit.
A Fight Over a Proposed Eighth-Floor Addition
The lawsuit is not only about repairs. Unit owners are also asking the court to block Gencom's plan to build an eight-story residential addition above the hotel's existing two-story, 5,200-square-foot ballroom — a project the developer has pursued using a City of Miami transit-oriented zoning ordinance that briefly allowed three stories of bonus height near transit hubs before it was repealed in June 2024. Owners argue the planned building violates the property's master declaration and question the zoning code used to approve it.
The Ritz-Carlton was one of four Center Grove developments — alongside Terra's The WELL on Tigertail Avenue, The Lincoln, and The Lennox — authorized to build under that now-rescinded bonus-height law, according to Coconut Grove Spotlight. Groveites have separately challenged The WELL's additional height and claim the ordinance was illegally adopted; Terra developed that project as an eight-story building after the site was originally limited to five floors, reflecting a wider pattern of zoning friction across the neighborhood.
Part of a Bigger Miami Portfolio
Gencom manages more than $8 billion in real estate assets across two dozen global properties and recently restructured into two divisions, Gencom Capital and Gencom Real Estate, to handle its growing deal pipeline, according to CoStar. The company's other South Florida projects include a $100 million Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne renovation that led to temporary layoffs for 425 employees last year, as well as the proposed Miami Riverbridge mixed-use development.
For now, the questions raised in the Coconut Grove lawsuit remain unresolved. Neither company has publicly addressed how the repair costs will ultimately be divided between the residential association and the hotel's ownership, and the fate of Gencom's proposed eighth tower now rests with the Miami-Dade Circuit Court.
