Condo associations representing 565 unit owners at Turnberry Isle's North and South towers have sued the City of Aventura and developer Jeffrey Soffer's affiliate, accusing the city of quietly rewriting its own rules to clear the way for two new condo towers on the property's tennis courts and spa. The federal complaint, filed in Miami, alleges the 29-story North and South towers' owners were cut out of a required approval process before officials signed off on Soffer's project.
The lawsuit, filed against the City of Aventura and Soffer affiliate YCM Acquisition LLC, was docketed August 6 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida as Case No. 1:26-cv-25303, brought under the federal civil rights statute 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, according to court records. As The Real Deal first reported, the associations claim Soffer put “unrelenting pressure” on the city to push the towers through. Soffer, who leads Fontainebleau Development, manages YCM Acquisition.
At the center of the dispute is a 2023 citywide ordinance that allowed underwater land to count toward a development site's size when calculating density, a change the lawsuit says applied citywide but was actually aimed squarely at the Turnberry Isle parcel. The ordinance, the suit alleges, created more development density without creating any usable land and passed without a public hearing. Soffer's condo project itself was later approved in 2025, also without a public hearing, according to the complaint.
Tennis Courts and Spa Targeted for New Towers
Soffer wants to build two condo towers with 264 units, plus parking and amenities, on the site of Turnberry Isle's existing tennis courts and spa. The associations say the project has parking noncompliance along with setback and open-space shortfalls, and they're asking a judge to declare that the project cannot proceed without their consent, while seeking to block the city from issuing any permits for it.
The lawsuit points to 2012 community agreements that the associations say mandate unanimous consent from Turnberry Isle parcel owners before any new construction or material site-plan changes can move forward. According to the complaint, a YCM affiliate first proposed a project in 2021 and again in 2023, and the North Tower opposed both proposals. Both proposals required city variance approval, the suit states. The associations are alleging anticipatory breach of the community agreements against YCM, along with due process violations under the 14th Amendment, and are seeking damages and attorneys' fees. The complaint also raises a separate question over whether standalone marina use is even permitted under the site's current zoning.
A Family With Deep Roots in the City It's Suing
The dispute lands squarely on the family that essentially built Aventura. The city was incorporated in 1995 out of a 785-acre master-planned community developed in the late 1960s by Don Soffer's Turnberry Associates, a history that helps explain why the Soffer name still carries outsized weight in Aventura's city hall. Don Soffer, considered the “godfather” of Aventura, built out much of the city, which later named a high school after him. Turnberry Isle itself was built by Turnberry starting in 1979 and 1980, and was incorporated into Aventura in 1995.
Jeffrey Soffer and his sister Jackie Soffer split the family empire in 2019, with Jeffrey keeping the Fontainebleau Miami Beach resort and Jackie retaining the Turnberry Company name, which includes Aventura Mall. Family holdings in Aventura still include the Turnberry Resort and Spa and the Turnberry Isle Country Club and its golf course. It isn't the first time Turnberry Isle unit owners have squared off with Soffer's entities in court: in December 2020, the Turnberry Isle Condominium Association sued YCM Acquisition in Miami-Dade Circuit Court, per The Real Deal, accusing the developer of failing to maintain the North Tower's lobby and parking garage ground floor. Earlier still, resort owners abruptly ended a 50-year hotel management agreement with Fairmont Hotels & Resorts in August 2011, a dispute that landed in federal court and settled in July 2012, restoring Soffer's direct operational control of the resort.
Aventura's Pattern of Granting Big Density Breaks
The current fight also fits a broader pattern of Aventura granting developers unusually generous zoning breaks. In October 2023, the City Commission approved a conditional-use floor area ratio of 4.8 for a residential project at 20605 NE 34th Avenue under the city's Green Building Program, more than triple the standard land development code limit of 1.5. And this past June, the commission unanimously approved height and density variances for Adam Neumann's Flow project along Biscayne Boulevard, allowing buildings as tall as 32 stories in exchange for community concessions.
Neither the City of Aventura nor Fontainebleau Development responded to requests for comment on the new lawsuit, with the city not immediately returning a request and Fontainebleau declining to comment. Attorneys for the Turnberry Isle associations also did not immediately provide a statement. Under federal civil rights law, the condo associations will need to show that city officials acted under color of state law to deprive them of constitutionally protected due process or vested property rights, a high bar that will determine whether the case survives in federal court at all.
