The scramble is on in greater Miami to find new sites for retail, Gadinsky Real Estate owner Seth Gadinsky tells us. (Every storage closet is a potential showroom.) Major retailers who are already here want to grow, and retailers new to the area want to get a piece of the action.

Greater Miami retail is on fire, Seth says, explaining that the recovery of the local economy is one reason, but not the only one. As far back as the 80s, Miami wasnt considered the hotspot for retail, so a lot of retailers bypassed the market for Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach. That left a legacy of fewer SF of retail per person in Miami-Dade than the other South Florida counties. Now, with the residential and jobs recovery, retailers are playing catch-up, Seth says.

Doral is one Miami-Dade market that Seth bets is underserved by retail. Gadinsky Real Estate and CC Lakeside OP recently inked a JV to develop Doral Signature Shops, a 11k SF shopping center at Doral Blvd and NW 114th Ave. Weve gotten a lot of interest from players who want to be in the market, he says--including commitments from Commerce Bank and Starbucks to occupy more than half of the property. (The question is: How have they lived this long without Starbucks?) The 11k SF shopping center will break ground in the fall, for a spring 2014 opening, and Seth tells us he expects it to be completely occupied before groundbreaking.

Delma Properties is betting there will be demand for more than retail space in Doral, namely office. The company is undertaking a multimillion-dollar renovation of the 187k SF 9250 Doral Ave to reposition it as a multi-tenant office building. A tenant who occupied all of the building left last year. Therearen'tmany 187k SF tenants active in the market, but if there were an opportunity to secure one, wed pursue a deal, Taylor & Mathis of Floridamarketing director Jeannette Mendoza, whos responsible for leasing the property, tells us. That said, theres a higher probability of leasing to several smaller tenants.