Growing South Florida population leads to commercial real estate boom

MIAMI, April 11, 2022 – Florida welcomed approximately 600 new residents a day in 2021, with a large percentage now calling South Florida home. This population influx is resulting in growing demand for commercial real estate services, leading JLL’s Miami Capital Markets office to promote three associates into production roles.

According to Real Capital Analytics, all commercial real estate trades in South Florida increased 183 percent year over year, with $8.8 billion in 2020 to $25 billion in 2021. JLL’s Miami Capital Markets office saw a 121 percent year-over-year increase in investment sales, debt and equity transactions in 2021. To continue to grow and to service existing clients, Cody Brais, Kenny Cutler and Max La Cava are now directors specializing in a variety of property types in Florida and the Southeast.

“People, companies and capital are moving to Florida in droves due to its business-friendly environment and excellent quality of life. Institutional investors have recognized this cultural shift and are tailoring their investment criteria to target markets like South Florida,” said Senior Managing Director Danny Finkle, who co-leads JLL’s Miami office and U.S. Retail Capital Markets platform. “The rapid growth of the South Florida market has created a multitude of exciting opportunities, and we continue to grow our Miami capital markets team with the very best talent in the industry to meet the needs of our clients in the market.”

As part of the investment advisory team, Brais and La Cava both focus on the disposition of commercial real estate assets across Florida and the Southeast. In 2020, Brais joined JLL’s industrial capital market’s team in South Florida, which specializes in industrial sales and equity capitalizations for all segments of industrial, including warehouses, distribution facility forward sales, flex space and cold storage. He joined JLL as part of its acquisition of HFF and has facilitated more than $4.8 billion of commercial real estate transactions during his career.

La Cava is a member of JLL’s International Capital Coverage Latin America Team and specializes in the execution of investment sale transactions and equity capitalization assignments on behalf of real estate developers, major property owners and global family offices. Additionally, he is part of JLL’s Single-Family Rental (SFR) Team formed in January 2021 due to the unprecedented growth and rapid institutionalization of the sector. Before joining JLL in 2019, he worked at a Miami-based private equity firm and at a bulge bracket private bank covering $18 billion of Latin American wealth.

Cutler is part of the debt and equity advisory team and joined JLL in 2019 as part of the HFF acquisition. He focuses on sourcing debt and equity placements, recapitalizations, permanent financing, bridge financing, construction financing and agency lending for multi-housing properties. Since starting his career as a commercial real estate analyst in 2017 after graduating from the University of Florida’s Master of Science in Real Estate (MSRE) program, he’s worked on closed commercial real estate transactions that total more than $2.4 billion in volume.

“The South Florida economy is thriving as the greater economy emerges from the pandemic and as a result all sectors within our industry are directly benefiting,” said Senior Managing Director Chris Drew, who co-leads JLL’s Miami capital markets office with Finkle. “We are incredibly proud of the team and culture that we have curated over the past several years and believe that JLL is well positioned to serve our clients with some of the brightest real estate minds in the industry.” 

According to the U.S. Census, the Sunshine State is the third most-populous state, with 21.78 million permanent residents, edging out New York. It posted the largest net domestic migration gains for the fifth consecutive year, and Redfin data reports Miami as the most popular migration destination of any U.S. metro area in the last four months of 2021, as remote workers and retirees seek warm weather and low taxes and cost of living when compared to other large coastal markets.

JLL Capital Markets is a full-service global provider of capital solutions for real estate investors and occupiers. The firm's in-depth local market and global investor knowledge delivers the best-in-class solutions for clients — whether investment and sales advisory, debt advisory, equity advisory or a recapitalization. The firm has more than 3,000 Capital Markets specialists worldwide with offices in nearly 50 countries.

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