Building collapse shows wealthy middle class township division تقسيم

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Surfside, Florida (AP) – The collapse of a Surfside condo tower may exacerbate an already existing divide between small-town Florida’s luxury buildings built for the global elite and those built decades ago for the middle class. It’s already causing a headache for some small businesses.

The city has seen the construction of so many new apartments in recent years that large oceanfront units exceeding 3,000 square feet (280 square meters) with modern amenities can fetch $10 million and up. Meanwhile, small units of 800 square feet (75 square meters) in adjacent apartment buildings built decades ago can cost as much as $400,000.

Anna Posovic, a South Florida real estate analyst, said the collapse of the 40-year-old Champlain Towers South will exacerbate that divide. At least 36 people were killed and more than 100 are still missing.

Posovich said many buyers will now avoid the older buildings, not only because they fear they might also fall but because of the repair costs Champlain South owners faced before the collapse: $80,000 to $300,000 per unit. These factors will reduce the value of older apartments, while the prices of luxury buildings will continue to rise.

“The venture capitalists who move here have never thought about the old buildings. They buy newer and pre-built structures, so I don’t see that as curbing their appetite,” Posovic, founder of Analytics Miami, said. Sales of old structures and increased market bifurcation.

Before the South Champlain Towers tragedy, Surfside, with a population of about 6,000 on half a square mile (1.3 square km) of an island off Miami, was one of the most unknown municipalities in South Florida — though Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner rented luxury In January an apartment in a new building, two blocks from the collapse.

Known for its clean beaches and maximum 12-storey building, the city stands in contrast to neighboring Miami Beach and its world-famous nightlife, Bal Harbor with its upscale shopping and both with its twin and triplex buildings. The tallest surfside hike.

Mayor Charles Burkett said the town has seen a “roller lane” of emotion since the collapse. The demolition of the remainder of the structure and Tropical Storm Elsa, which brought strong winds and torrential rain to the area, intensified what the community went through.

“We’ve faced countless challenges, but a little bit of good news is that the resources we have are all aligned, all focused and heading in the same direction,” he said.

Ryan Mermer moved to Surfside earlier this year from Palm Beach County, where the calm and proximity of the town drew him to Miami’s thriving business climate and large Orthodox Jewish community. On Saturdays, much of the city is closed for Saturday except for the supermarkets. Surfside was home to Isaac Bashevis Singer, the Yiddish poet and short story writer who won the 1978 Nobel Prize in Literature.

But Mermer also got a deal on a tiny apartment built half a century ago, just steps away from the luxury apartment where former President Donald Trump’s daughter and son-in-law moved in. While the Mermer Building was built for the middle class, today’s building targets the elite in New York, Europe, and South America, who are attracted by the state’s lifestyle, weather, and lack of income tax.

“I pay $1,375 (monthly) … across the street from the beach; Ivanka and Jared pay $38,000,” Mermer, a real estate agent who also works for Holocaust Heroes Worldwide, a support group for Nazi death camp survivors, said.

In a low-key shopping district on Surfside one afternoon, barber Aramis Armor and Freddy Elias, co-owner of a tailoring and dry-cleaning shop, had no customers. Both said the pandemic had hit their businesses hard, and the resulting collapse and street closures made it difficult for anyone to reach them.

In normal times, Omar says, the business district is packed with families – they can eat ice cream, eat pizza or drink coffee at the many locally owned businesses dotted downtown.

They are all very nice, and the customers are very good,” Armor said. He blamed city officials for his lack of business, saying the collapsed building should never have been allowed to decay as it did.

Elias, who has owned the Surfside business for 25 years, hopes to lend him a low-interest federal loan promised by President Joe Biden’s administration to crash-affected stores until his customers return. Meanwhile, the partner was going to the customer’s house for installation rather than having the customer resist traffic to get to the store.

“Since COVID and now this tragedy, it has been very bad for us,” Elias said. “We need help.”

The streets reopened this week.

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Frisaro reported from Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Associated Press writers Mike Schneider in Orlando and Gisela Salomon in Miami; Photographer Marta Lavander at Surfside; Researcher Randy Hershaft of New York contributed to this report.

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