Russell and Marisa Galbut’s GFO Investments scored a $54 million construction loan to build a new Whole Foods-anchored retail building in Miami Beach.
Miami-based Ocean Bank provided the financing, records and real estate database Vizzda show. An affiliate of Miami-based GFO paid $15 million for the redevelopment site at 1901 Alton Road. The developer plans to demolish an existing Wells Fargo branch to make way for a four-story project spanning nearly 200,000 square feet. GFO has not disclosed a construction timeline.
In 1998, SouthTrust Bank paid $1.6 million for the 1.3-acre site, records show. Wachovia acquired SouthTrust in 2005, and three years later, Wells Fargo bought Wachovia.
Last year, the Miami Beach Design Review Board approved the planned retail building, and Whole Foods signed a lease with GFO’s affiliate. Whole Foods would occupy 38,100 square feet on the ground floor and mezzanine level of the planned building designed by Miami Shores-based Studio Mc+G Architecture. The project would also include 277 parking spaces.
Russell Galbut, who is also a principal of Miami-based Crescent Heights, has been eyeing the 1901 Alton Road property for a Whole Foods supermarket for a decade. The developer had submitted a site plan application in 2015, but Galbut did not move forward at that time, city records show.
Whole Foods, a subsidiary of billionaire Jeff Bezos’ Amazon, currently occupies a standalone supermarket at 1020 Alton Road in Miami Beach. The national grocery chain is also an anchor tenant at Nema Miami, a mixed-use project in Miami’s Edgewater neighborhood. Developed by Crescent Heights, the 38-story multifamily and retail tower is nearly complete and the 50,000-square-foot Whole Foods opened on Thursday.
Last year, Whole Foods bought the 97,674-square-foot ground-floor space at the the Met3 mixed-use tower in downtown Miami. Whole Foods paid $21 million for the commercial unit, which is occupied by one of its stores.
