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Adam Neumann's Flow Pays $70.5M For 16-Acre Miami Development Site

Former WeWork CEO Adam Neumann brought home a win after his company’s apartment brand, Flow Life, secured the 16-acre Biscayne 85 property in a court-ordered auction for $70.5M, doubling the initial stalking horse bid of $35M.

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The Biscayne 85 site at 8500 Biscayne Blvd.

Flow’s winning bid came at a Jan. 15 auction, besting Miami-based development firm Melo Group's $35M bid from October.

“The winning bid from Flow Life was double the initial stalking horse bid and will result in the recovery of a substantial amount of the victim’s losses,” Avison Young principal Michael T. Fay said in a statement, referring to litigation stemming from allegations that the property's former owner misappropriated funds raised through the EB-5 immigrant investor program. 

The 16-acre development site at 8500 Biscayne Blvd. was sold on behalf of those victims, who were promised U.S. visas in exchange for investments in the site and its neighboring parcel at 7880 Biscayne Blvd.

A lawsuit filed in 2020 by EB-5 investor Chun Liu accused previous owner Florida Fullview and its manager, Leo Wu, of defrauding 99 foreign investors of more than $50M. The investors were aiming to finance the redevelopment of the two sites and earn U.S. green cards.

The redevelopment never materialized, and the investors’ funds were allegedly misappropriated for other purposes, The Real Deal reported.

The January sale was facilitated by Avison Young’s Florida capital markets group’s Fay and his team on behalf of the court-appointed receiver, Michael Goldberg.

In 2023, B Group Capital Management bid $102M for Biscayne 85 as part of a joint sale that included the adjacent 3.5-acre parcel, a former U.S. immigration building site, TRD reported. 

But the deal ultimately fell through. B Group only secured the former U.S. immigration building, leaving Biscayne 85 behind, an Avison Young representative told Bisnow.

Biscayne 85 was previously the site of Little Farm Trailer Park and had been under court-appointed receivership since 2021, the South Florida Business Journal reported. It is zoned for a mixed-use development with up to 3.5M SF of buildable space and 2,380 residential units.

The purchase marks the most recent expansion into the region for Flow, the  commercial real estate firm Neumann launched in late 2023, after his departure from WeWork. 

The company first debuted its multifamily investment venture in April 2024 with two apartment buildings in South Florida dubbed Flow Fort Lauderdale and Flow Miami. Neumann’s company also purchased the Aventura Corporate Center, a Miami office building, in partnership with Israeli investment firm Canada Global for $116.2M in November.

“We’re excited about the opportunity to collaborate with the local community and unlock the full potential of these remarkable 16 acres in Miami,” a Flow spokesperson told Bisnow in a statement.