The Estate Companies has paid $13 million for a 1.2-acre parcel at 411 West Railroad Avenue in downtown West Palm Beach, setting up a 15-story, 310-unit apartment tower called Soleste Palm Station Two just steps from an existing Soleste project and the city's Brightline rail hub. The site sits about five blocks north of CityPlace, and the deal closed with an $8.4 million loan from Banesco USA that public records show can be increased to $16.9 million.
The purchase, first reported by The Real Deal, was sold by an entity of Miami-based Sunview Companies. The Railroad Avenue plot last changed hands for $6.8 million in 2016, meaning its value has nearly doubled in a decade as multifamily development has boomed across West Palm Beach, according to the outlet's report. The Estate Companies is headquartered in South Miami and led by principals Robert Suris and Jeffrey Ardizon, who together oversee a South Florida development pipeline of roughly 5,000 rental units and 153,000 square feet of commercial space, per The Real Deal's earlier reporting on the firm's expansion.
A Second Phase Rises Beside the First
The new tower will sit directly adjacent to The Belvedere by Soleste, also known as Soleste Palm Station, an eight-floor, 321-unit project at 550 North Rosemary Avenue that The Estate Companies began building in 2022 and has not yet opened, according to the developer's own website. That first phase was financed with a $72.5 million construction loan from Synovus Bank in August 2024, covering a 2.5-acre parcel the company originally bought for $15.8 million in 2021, according to Multi-Housing News. With the Railroad Avenue purchase, the developer is effectively doubling its footprint along the transit corridor.
Soleste Palm Station Two is designed by architectural firm BC Architects with civil engineering by Craven Thompson & Associates, and its floor plans lean small: the project includes 84 micro units alongside larger one- and two-bedroom layouts, with studios ranging from 377 to 465 square feet and two-bedrooms reaching up to 1,180 square feet, according to Traded. Amenities will include 8,200 square feet of indoor space and a 2,200-square-foot rooftop lounge. Soleste Living, the developer's apartment brand, now encompasses 11 complexes across South Florida, including two in Palm Beach County.
Live Local Act Clears the Path Near Brightline
The project moved through West Palm Beach's Plans and Plats Review Committee in May, part of a wave of developers using Florida's Live Local Act to bypass traditional rezoning on commercial parcels near the Brightline station, according to Commercial Observer. The statute has reshaped how land near the rail corridor gets underwritten, letting developers convert office, retail, or hotel-zoned sites into dense residential projects through administrative sign-offs rather than lengthy discretionary hearings. Soleste Palm Station Two is one of several major projects using that pathway alongside proposals from Related Ross, led by billionaire Steve Ross, and homebuilder Jeff Greene, whose 25-story mass-timber tower at 120 South Dixie Highway would be the tallest structure of its kind in Florida if built as proposed.
The micro-unit approach reflects a broader push among South Florida developers to offer more attainable rentals as housing costs climb. Palm Beach County condo prices have risen 247 percent since 2011 and were up roughly 4 percent year-over-year last month, according to Miami Realtors data cited in the article. CityPlace, the mixed-use hub near the Railroad Avenue site, has drawn luxury commercial and residential development over the past decade following its own major redevelopment, and other players including Gilbert Benhamou and O.D. Kobo have been active in the area's condo market.
Part of a Wider Regional Buildout
The Estate Companies has been financing Soleste-branded projects across the region in quick succession. In September 2025, the firm secured a $60 million construction loan for a 255-unit garden-style community in Riviera Beach, roughly eight miles northwest of downtown West Palm Beach and slated for completion in 2027. In December 2024, it landed $78 million in financing for a 347-unit project in Davie, with a second 310-unit phase also planned there, including ground-floor live-work units and deed-restricted affordable housing.
Those deals came during an unprecedented regional apartment boom: nearly 24,000 units were completed across South Florida in 2024, the highest annual volume since at least 2002, according to Berkadia market data reported by The Real Deal. Out-of-state migration and rapid pandemic-era rent increases supercharged construction across the region, fueling the kind of multi-phase expansion now playing out along West Palm Beach's rail corridor.
Downtown's Transit Corridor Keeps Filling In
The Railroad Avenue purchase adds to a crowded pipeline of projects clustering around the Brightline station. Just across the tracks at 506 Datura Street, developers LD&D and IGEQ broke ground this summer on a 21-story tower combining 181 luxury apartments with a Marriott Tribute Portfolio hotel set to open in 2028. Institutional investors have also been circling existing inventory nearby — in March, Denver-based Griffis Residential bought a 263-unit downtown complex as the first purchase for its $550 million value-add apartment fund, betting on West Palm Beach's strong rent growth and steep barriers to single-family homeownership.
