Trump Wins Approval Of 1,500-Unit Luxury Condo Project
Days before his return to the White House, Donald Trump's real estate company secured approval to develop four condominium towers outside Miami.
And in a change from the project's original proposal, the president-elect's name will adorn the project.
The Doral City Council voted unanimously Wednesday night to approve The Trump Organization's plan to develop 1,498 units across four 20-story towers, 142K SF of luxury retail and restaurant space, and a four-story building with 20 villas.
The project will be called the Trump Doral International Towers. When the project was proposed in 2022, and when it was given preliminary approval in August, it was simply billed as Doral International Towers.
“It always has and will be a Trump product,” Felix Lasarte, the attorney representing Trump in the project and the founder of The Lasarte Law Firm, told Bisnow.
Not only will this be the first active development by a sitting U.S. president, but this will be The Trump Organization's first self-developed investment in South Florida since 2012, according to the company's website.
The vote clears the way for Trump to build the residential and commercial complex at 4400 NW 87th Ave. around the existing hotel at the Trump National Doral Golf Club, which Trump purchased for $150M in 2012. The project will also include a 3-acre park with a plaza and water feature and more than 3,000 parking spaces.
Each tower in the 5M SF project is planned to include ground-floor commercial space, pool decks on the seventh floor and a rooftop garden terrace.
“I think it's important to know that this is a large application, but this is something that we took seriously,” Lasarte told council members at their Wednesday evening meeting. “And every single thing has been reviewed. Every i was dotted and every t was crossed.”
The Trump Doral International Towers will have 332 one-bedroom units, 557 two-bedroom units, 280 three-bedroom units and 309 four-bedroom units, with sizes between 885 SF and 5K SF. The villa building will feature eight three-bedroom units and 12 four-bedroom units, ranging from more than 1K SF to more than 3,400 SF, each with rooftop terraces.
Condos are expected to begin selling within the next 18 months starting at $2M, Lasarte said.
Trump Organization Executive Vice President Eric Trump — who is leading the company while his father, its CEO, serves as president — attended the meeting at the Doral Government Center, sitting quietly in the third row to show support for the project.
No members of the public spoke during the public comment period for the project, clearing the way for a quick hearing and eventual 4-to-0 vote in favor of the project less than an hour after the meeting began. Doral City Council Member Digna Cabral wasn't in attendance due to a medical emergency.
The project was first introduced in August 2022 with a plan to build 2,209 units. The proposal was trimmed this past summer when the city gave its first approval to rezone the property in a 3-to-2 vote.
At the hearing Wednesday evening, council members said they were initially concerned about the density of the project and its potential impact on Doral’s quality of life, largely the traffic that it could generate.
But Doral Mayor Christi Fraga and Council Member Rafael Pinyero, who voted against the plans in August, both voted to approve it at Wednesday’s hearing.
“Obviously, there's a lot of investment and care for this project and this property by the family and the organization, and I wanted to thank you all for really being patient and working with us to improve the portions of this project that were of concern,” Fraga said.
Lasarte said during the hearing that he has been working on the proposal for more than four years and was grateful that the development can now move forward with sales.
“It actually took Trump less time to become president again than it did for me to get this thing approved,” Lasarte said.