'Million Dollar Listing' star Ryan Serhant recruited to sell entire waterfront condo

'Million Dollar Listing' star Ryan Serhant recruited to sell entire waterfront condo
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"Million Dollar Listing" star Ryan Serhant sells Florida condo
Former "Million Dollar Listing New York" star Ryan Serhant is representing La Fontana condominium in West Palm Beach, which is up for sale.
The owners are hoping the prime waterfront location will attract a developer to demolish and rebuild.
A previous deal fell through with a developer who wanted to purchase La Fontana and the neighboring Portofino building together.
Rising costs, including a pending fire safety mandate, are motivating factors for selling.
Owners at the waterfront La Fontana condominium in West Palm Beach, Florida are putting their entire 140-unit building up for sale after failing to seal deals with two billionaire developers.
They've recruited former 'Million Dollar Listing New York' star Ryan Serhant and his firm to represent the 64-year-old building with the idea it would be demolished and replaced by new construction.
The address, 2800 N. Flagler Drive, is an attractive location just north of bustling downtown West Palm Beach and sitting directly on the Intracoastal Waterway with nearly three acres of land. It's two miles south of the Lake Worth Inlet, also known as the Palm Beach Inlet, and next to Currie Park, which is currently undergoing a $35 million renovation.
La Fontana's association board had previously considered asking for $225 million for the building but there's no sale price set on the current listing, which is being handled off market.
'It's not the building, it's the land,' said La Fontana board President Paul Moreno. 'The general consensus is it will be knocked down and something else will be built.'
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Moreno said the building is current on inspections and in compliance with state safety legislation. But a pending state fire safety mandate to install a pricey new 'engineered life safety system' helped convince some La Fontana owners to sell.
'We're not desperate,' Moreno said. 'But the sprinklers are a ton of work and a lot of money.'
La Fontana has been courted by developer Al Adelson and saw some interest from the city's dominant developer, Related Ross, according to Moreno.
But Adelson was adamant that he wanted a package deal of La Fontana and its 56-year-old neighbor building Portofino, where there currently aren't enough residents willing to sell. Adelson was offering $150 million for each building. The purchase would have given him a waterfront footprint of about 5.5 acres.
Moreno said Ross was looking at a longer timeline for purchase that was "not in compliance" with what the board wanted.
Because La Fontana is a co-op — where owners purchase shares in a corporation that owns the entire building — it needs 80% of residents willing to sell. Portofino is a traditional condominium. That means it is governed by rules that say a sale must be approved by 80% of unit owners, but if 5% or more vote no, they can block the sale and another vote can't happen for two years.
'Our owners are pretty content here,' said Portofino board president Michelle Alber. 'We feel like we have a little slice of heaven and if you look at the prices of new construction on the water, it's unobtainable for most of our owners.'
Cynthia Witter bought her unit in Portofino for $218,000 in 2003. She also owns a unit at La Fontana that she paid $135,000 for, also in 2003.
The cheapest waterfront new construction condominiums in West Palm Beach are at least $1 million. Even with a hefty payout from a developer, it would be a stretch for many Portofino and La Fontana owners to buy a new unit and keep up with association fees and taxes.
Still, Witter said she's ready to sell both of her units.
'I think it's an opportunity and my own personal opinion is these units aren't going to go up in value,' she said. 'If La Fontana gets knocked down and starts building, it's going to be awful at Portofino.'
Along North Flagler Drive there are at least seven new condominium projects planned or already under construction. Some are as tall as 28 stories, with one trying to go to 31 stories.
Christian Prakas, a founding partner of Serhant's Delray Beach office who is helping market La Fontana, said owners there are smart to sell now before the market is saturated with new construction.
Serhant also already has someone working on getting city code changes to allow for a taller building on the site.
'This is one of the most valuable spots on North Flagler because it's actually on the water, not across from the water, and has riparian rights, making boat slips possible,' Prakas said.
While condo sales in which the entire building agrees to sell were uncommon in the past, that may change with new Surfside safety rules, higher insurance rates and aging retirees. Prakas said this is the first whole building sale Serhant has done in South Florida, although it has brokered similar deals in New York.
'I think we are going to see a massive flood of these coming to the market in the next 10 years as the baby boomers are passing away and their heirs will not want to carry these condos with rising costs and high assessments,' Prakas said.
Alber, the Portofino board president, emphasized that while the building is not actively for sale, owners would be willing to entertain offers.
'Who knows what might come our way,' she said.
Kimberly Miller is a journalist for The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA Today Network of Florida. She covers real estate, weather, and the environment. Subscribe to The Dirt for a weekly real estate roundup. If you have news tips, please send them to kmiller@pbpost.com. Help support our local journalism, subscribe today.

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The NBA without the Buss family owning the Lakers sounds… weird. Dr. Jerry Buss purchased the Lakers when Ronald Reagan was entering the White House and he proceeded to transform both the team and the league. There is the on-court success, where the Lakers have won 11 championships since Buss bought the franchise, while boasting a parade of 'face of the game' level players: Magic Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, and now LeBron James, with Luka Doncic. Laker fans should be estatic. A few things I can tell you about Mark - he is driven by winning, excellence, and doing everything the right way. AND he will put in the resources needed to win! I can understand why Jeanie sold the team to Mark Walter because they are just alike -… Beyond that, Dr. Buss changed how the sport was packaged as a product — this was entertainment. This was an event. It was the Laker girls and music pumped in the arena (not just an organist), it was Dancing Barry and celebrities sitting courtside. The modern fan sporting experience started with Buss' vision. Now, Lakers ownership is changing. Once approved this summer by the Board of Governors, it will be Mark Walter, the CEO of global investment firm Guggenheim Partners, who will have bought the franchise at a $10 billion valuation. Jeanie Buss reported will stay on as the team's governor (she and the Buss family will retain 18% ownership, according to reports). Sale about change Is the sale of the Lakers good or bad for the franchise? Is it good or bad for the NBA? Yes. The answers are nuanced. It's also not the right question, Is this the end of family ownership in the NBA? Yes This is the real takeaway from the sale. The days of an NBA team as a family-run operation — especially where the team is the primary source of income, as it was for the Buss children — are gone. Big-time professional sports are now an investment for the ultra-wealthy. Fans look at the Lakers' brand, the superstar players, how often they are on national television, the purple-and-gold jerseys in the crowd at road games, and with all that comes a perception that the Lakers were a free-spending, do-whatever-it-takes-to-win organization. They were not even close. Behind the scenes, this was a relative mom-and-pop operation because it had to be — and if it wasn't for a very generous local television contract it would have been much more noticeable (but betting on cable television to keep funding the team is a losing proposition long term). The Lakers did not spend top dollar on coaches (remember Ty Lue going across town?). They did not spend to beef up basketball operations and staff — Oklahoma City has a larger scouting and basketball operations team. That's what Walter's ownership changes and why Lakers fans should feel positive. Under Walter's ownership, the Dodgers have unashamedly acted like the richest kids on the block, and have been rewarded for it on the field. For a Lakers team going into summer negotiations with Doncic and LeBron, having a deep-pocketed owner willing to spend matters, even if the NBA's tax structure limits that spending. The Lakers are an amazing organization. I'm looking forward to meeting Mark and excited about the future. I am also grateful to Jeanie and the Buss family for welcoming me to LA, and I'm happy that Jeanie will continue to be involved. I look forward to working with both of them… What Walter did with the Dodgers was spend — not just on players, he also upgraded Dodger Stadium, he beefed up the team's front office (stealing the GM from another team), its analytics department, and he spent big on player development. He turned the Dodgers into Goliath and has a couple of World Series wins to show for it. Walter can't just spend to buy players under the NBA's punitive salary cap/luxury tax system, but his Lakers will start acting like a rich team off the court. Expect the Lakers' front office and scouting teams to grow. Expect a focus on player development. Expect facility upgrades (not at which is owned by AEG, but other team facilities). The Lakers didn't act like the richest kids on the block — that other team in Los Angeles did — and around the Lakers there are a lot of little stories that highlight things. As noted at ESPN: 'An assistant coach was not approved to stay at the same hotel as the player he was traveling to work out with in the offseason because the room was too expensive.' All that is about to change. Something lost With that, a connection between the fans and the owner is lost. Jeanie Buss will remain the team governor and in some ways face of ownership, but Walter and his investment team will have the final say. A much more corporate entity runs the Lakers now, whatever face they put on it. The same was true in Dallas, where part of the loss in Mark Cuban selling the Mavericks was not having him as the recognizable owner fans to relate to (and talk to). The same is true in Boston, where Wyc Grousbeck was always a rich, corporate owner, but one fan saw, who a year ago was carrying the Larry O'Brien Trophy around the streets of Boston during a parade, high-fiving fans. The trend toward corporatization and private equity/investment banking touching everything is not just a sports thing, it's a societal thing. It's the way of the world. It's just going to feel a little different for the NBA. At least Jeanie Buss will still be around and have a voice in the Lakers, but it's not going to be the same. Not that it will matter to Lakers fans if they start winning like the Dodgers.