A shopping center in Aventura’s Biscayne Boulevard retail corridor sold for $48M.

An entity tied to Miami-based Elysee Investments purchased Aventura Plaza at 17801 Biscayne Blvd., a 90K SF shopping center that includes a two-story office building, according to a release. The seller was Aventura Plaza Partners, a family-owned entity registered in Sunny Isles and managed by Marilyn Klompus.

The plaza was 92% leased at the time of the sale, with the 66K SF of retail space fully occupied and around 7,200 SF of vacant office space. The property was built between 1972 and 1974, property records indicate, and the seller had owned the property for several decades, according to the release.

“Major retail shopping center sales in Aventura are extremely rare and, as expected, the offering generated incredible interest,” Mark Gilbert, vice chair at Cushman & Wakefield, which represented the seller, said in a statement.

Plum Market, a family-owned specialty grocer, opened its first Florida location at Aventura Plaza last January, replacing an Office Depot that had been the strip center’s anchor tenant. Other retailers at the plaza include Ace Hardware and Anthony’s Coal Fired Pizza & Wings.

Gilbert said the arrival of the grocery store helped to position the plaza for sale in “one of South Florida’s most sought-after trade areas for retail ownership given its excellent demographics and strong leasing fundamentals.”

Cushman & Wakefield brokers Adam Feinstein and Mitchell Halpern also represented the seller in the deal.

Elysee Investments is a private real estate investment firm with assets in South Florida and New York City. It primarily holds retail and office assets with a concentration of properties in Miami Beach.

Haim Yehezkel, Elysee’s founder and CEO, was among the partnership that acquired the Time Century Jewelry Center for $27.5M last month, just before the 225K SF retail and office building was slated for a foreclosure auction. The property was sold by Yair Levy after a renovation stalled and City National Bank of Florida sued over an unpaid $26M construction loan.

Elysee Investments also paid $5.5M for an 8,700 SF retail property at 6644 Collins Ave. in July.

The investment firm didn’t respond to Bisnow’s request for comment on the Aventura Plaza acquisition.

Aventura is among the top suburban retail markets in Miami, with a 2% total vacancy rate that is a percentage point lower than the overall vacancy rate across the county, according to Colliers. The $60.12-per-SF asking rate at the end of December was second only to Coconut Grove among suburban markets and less than $5 below asking rates in the Biscayne Corridor.

Gilbert said in a phone interview that the December 2022 opening of a Brightline station in Aventura was transformative for the city, adding that “the amount of residential growth and commercial activity in the region is probably unprecedented.”

Aventura-based BH Group filed plans to build a nine-story medical office building at 2760 NE 208th Terrace, across from the Aventura Mall and south of HCA Florida Aventura Hospital, the South Florida Business Journal reported. The developer is planning to build 50K SF of office space with a 5,700 SF ground-floor restaurant space and 213-car parking garage.

BH Group’s proposal follows a pre-application filed by Privé Group for an 11-story office building with a 12-unit residential component connected by a seven-story parking garage at 18802 and 18820 W. Dixie Highway in the Ojus neighborhood near the Aventura Mall.