Beleaguered developer Alirio Torrealba, who has been hit with a string of lender lawsuits in recent months, is shopping around a Hialeah multifamily development site.
Torrealba’s Coral Gables-based MG Developer listed the vacant property of its planned Metro Station II project at 2701 and 2765 East 11th Avenue. Cushman & Wakefield is marketing the property, but the asking price wasn’t disclosed. MG Developer and listing agent Virgilio Fernandez of Cushman didn’t provide insight on the target price range.
“The sale of the parcel of land for Metro Station II will allow us to further meet our current obligations,” MG Developer said in a statement.
The site is approved for an eight-story, 110-unit building with two levels of parking and six residential floors.
The site consists of a pair of adjacent lots that span just under an acre, according to the listing. It has transit district zoning due to its proximity to a hub for Tri-Rail and Metrorail stations.
The site is entitled for 23 studios, 64 one-bedroom apartments and 23 one-bedroom units with dens, the listing shows.
It’s next to MG Developer’s nearly finished Metro Station I, an eight-story, 55-unit building at 2691 East 11th Avenue.
While the listed property isn’t subject to any of the nine lender lawsuits filed against MG affiliates since the spring, it has its own set of woes.
Miami-based Modis Architects sued last month seeking foreclosure of its liens on six MG projects, including its lien for $578,294 on the Metro Station II project, according to the complaint. In May, Miami-based Bliss & Nyitray filed a $63,575 construction lien on the property for engineering and design services it provided, according to the filing.
Over the span of a decade, Venezuela native Torrealba built up MG Developer into one of South Florida’s most prolific residential developers. But since the spring, MG affiliates have come under fire with nine lenders filing suits.
In past statements, MG Developer has stressed that it’s continuing its projects, while it’s navigating complex capital deals and is in “good-faith discussions” with the majority of its lenders to resolve outstanding issues.
The majority of the suits are from lenders that loaned smaller amounts, ranging from $750,000 to $6 million, and aren’t seeking foreclosure but generally levy breach-of-note claims. In the past, MG has identified these lenders as its long-time investors and business partners.
Only one of the nine complaints is for foreclosure: Slate Property Group and The Carlyle Group sued last month over allegations of default on $31.1 million in loans for the 10-story, 347-unit Metro Parc South multifamily project in Hialeah. The complaint alleges the default stems from MG allowing construction liens on the property, and failing to make required reserve deposits and pay property taxes last year.
MG is in “good-faith negotiations, including securing an additional investor, to bring this matter to a prompt resolution,” a spokesperson for the firm told The Real Deal regarding the foreclosure complaint.
Another more recent suit, this one filed last month by BHI Lending over an alleged default on a $2.5 million debt provided in April, revealed that MG is in the process of offloading its stake in another of its development sites.
Company affiliate MG NBV is selling its stake in a North Bay Village condo development site to project partner Prosper Group, led by Jay Roberts, for $20 million, according to records attached to the complaint. As of late last year, MG and Prosper had planned to co-develop a 30-story, 147-unit condo tower on the property at 1681 and 1725 North Bay Causeway.
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