Miami’s commercial real estate market attracts large, sophisticated foreign investors.

Miami’s commercial real estate market attracts large, sophisticated foreign investors, who are looking for a culturally attractive, economically stable place. International investment in commercial real estate has changed in Miami, drive through the city’s central business district: Where there once were vacant lots and aging buildings off Brickell Avenue, there’s a giant and still-growing beehive of construction for Brickell City Centre. It’s a more than $1 billion investment by Hong Kong-based Swire Properties that someday will cover several city blocks with a cluster of commercial and residential buildings. About two miles north of the City Centre site off Biscayne Boulevard, the former Miami Herald building, once one of downtown’s landmark properties, sits empty, awaiting its destiny. The Malaysian conglomerate Genting bought the site and surrounding properties. So far, the company has invested an estimated $500 million on its vision to create a downtown gambling Mecca and resort that apparently will rest with getting legislation passed in Tallahassee. Genting Resorts World wants to build a scaled-back, slots-only resort on the Miami waterfront.The proposal for a slots-only casino would include a partnership that would allow it to use a permit owned by Gulfstream racetrack to open a slots casino at the Biscayne Bay property.If approved by legislators or state gambling regulators, Genting's Resorts World Miami would open with 2,000 slot machines and off-track betting. It’s not just the monster projects that attract foreign investors. Others say smaller overseas investors from overseas still have a place in Miami. They tend to buy gas stations, warehouses, small offices and stores. Often the purchases are made under federal visa programs that encourage foreign business investment in exchange for US residency or citizenship rights. The investors typically come from South America, Central America and Europe.When there’s political or economic turmoil overseas, like the current situation in Venezuela, business people from those countries look for safe haven investments – and the US is among their prime targets. A lot of the investment activity in Miami under the EB-5 visa program for foreign investors, has come from Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela. As a way to obtain a green card, the EB-5 program permits foreigners to invest at least $1 million, or at least $500,000 in designated areas, in business ventures that will create or preserve at least 10 jobs for US workers. A survey released last year by the Association of Foreign Investors in Real Estate found that the US dominates the list of countries where its members plan to invest in commercial real estate. The top five countries were, in order: the US, Canada, Germany, Australia the United Kingdom. Lazaro Lopez Fortune Int'l Realty 1390 Brickell Ave, Suite 104 Miami, Fl. 33131 http://www.LazaroLopez.com http://www.MiamiPropertyConsultant.com (786) 525-9430