{"id":58544,"date":"2025-05-30T19:48:35","date_gmt":"2025-05-30T19:48:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/2025\/05\/30\/developers-struggle-to-start-projects-in-the-fog-of-tariff-uncertainty\/"},"modified":"2025-05-30T19:48:35","modified_gmt":"2025-05-30T19:48:35","slug":"developers-struggle-to-start-projects-in-the-fog-of-tariff-uncertainty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/2025\/05\/30\/developers-struggle-to-start-projects-in-the-fog-of-tariff-uncertainty\/","title":{"rendered":"Developers Struggle To Start Projects In The Fog Of Tariff Uncertainty"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Developers<\/div>

Even South Florida’s most active condo developer can’t avoid being caught in the middle of the changing-by-the-day tariff policies of the Trump administration.
\nRelated Group\u00a0bought $2M worth of tiles from Asia for one of its projects last month, swallowing a 25% tariff to ship them to the U.S., Related Group Executive Vice President Patrick Campbell said at Bisnow\u2019s Broward County State of the Market event on Thursday.
\nIf it had waited a week, the import levy would have been a far more manageable 10%, Campbell said.
\n\u201cIt was a huge, huge issue, and when we first started realizing what’s happening, we’re saying, \u2018Don’t ship it, don’t ship it. We don’t want it. We’ll take the deposit, do whatever you want,\u2019\u201d Campbell said. \u201cIt’s far better than actually having to pay the duty once it gets here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bisnow\/Chloe Gallivan
\nK Group Holdings\u2019 Joseph Kavana, Related Group\u2019s Patrick Campbell, Moderno Development\u2019s Doron Broman and H2M’s Greg Cellamare.
\nTariff unpredictability, rising construction costs and fluctuating interest rates are making it harder for developers, and their lenders and investors, to plan ahead. But navigating the unknown has become part of doing business, industry professionals said at the event, held at\u00a0Fort Lauderdale\u2019s Downtown Event Center.
\n\u201cWe’re kind of in a time where decisions are still being made daily, and we’re not certain how it’s going to affect things overall,\u201d Campbell said.
\nIn the two months since President Donald Trump held his \u201cLiberation Day\u201d tariff announcement at the White House, markets around the world have struggled to find their footing. Different products and countries have been faced with different tax rates at different times, and some of the policies have been blocked, then reinstated\u00a0by federal courts.
\nWhile the final outcome of the policies is still impossible to predict, the uncertainty has had an impact in the bond markets,\u00a0and\u00a0Federal Reserve officials are holding their benchmark interest rates steady for fear that cutting rates now would worsen inflation.
\nDevelopers are hoping for interest rate relief sooner rather than later, but founder and managing partner of Moderno Development Doron Broman said he\u2019s already written off 2025 \u2014 a setback that\u2019s weighing on property values and making new projects harder to justify.
\n\u201cI’m like an addict: Every day I look at the 10-year note, at least twice a day or three times a day, and hopefully it’s starting to move down, but it’s not,\u201d Broman said. \u201cIt’s probably\u00a0going to\u00a0take some time.\u201d
\nThe wild swings have made it difficult for contractors to make decisions and price risk, especially\u00a0with prices climbing sharply, reaching an annualized jump\u00a0of 9.7%\u00a0in the end of the first quarter, Construction Dive reported in April.
\nThe 10-year Treasury yield\u00a0still\u00a0has the potential to climb to 5%, threatening to put projects on ice, according to a CBRE\u00a0analysis.
\n\u201cConstruction costs are an ongoing thing,\u201d Campbell said. \u201cWe’re still trying to figure out what tariffs are going to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bisnow\/Chloe Gallivan
\nEdens\u2019 Nicole Shiman, Stiles\u2019 Rocco Ferrera, Linkvest Capital\u2019s Camilo Ni\u00f1o, Falcone Group\u2019s Alfonso Costa Jr. and Greenberg Traurig’s Jonathan Gelman.
\nOn the financing side of the deal, traditional lenders have pulled back and developers are increasingly leaning on private financing because they are the only ones willing to lend, said\u00a0Camilo Ni\u00f1o,\u00a0CEO and founder of co-investment platform Linkvest Capital.
\nEven now, with banks coming back into the lending space\u00a0as they\u00a0have\u00a0started to rid themselves of troubled property loans, they\u2019re not comfortable financing new construction, panelists said.
\n\u201cI thought that with the new president and the promise of deregulation, I thought that the bank was going to become more aggressive again, and that is not happening,\u201d Ni\u00f1o said. \u201cNeither the regulation, neither the willingness of the banks to lend.\u201d
\nThe\u00a0uncertainty has also rippled through South Florida\u2019s foreign investment landscape, with international buyers\u00a0skittish about\u00a0where policy and rates are headed next, keeping their capital on the sidelines, Ni\u00f1o said.
\nAlfonso Costa Jr., chief operating officer of the Falcone Group and former deputy chief of staff at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, said foreign condo buyers at his projects have paused to assess the current environment. He’s not alone \u2014 international buyers spent\u00a0$2B less on Miami\u00a0condos\u00a0in 2024 than they did in 2023, and real estate agents say 2025 has been even slower.<\/p>\n

Bisnow\/Chloe Gallivan
\nThe Estate Cos.\u2019 Jeffrey Ardizon, Cymbal DLT\u2019s Hector Delatorres, Newgard Development Group\u2019s Bromley Kelley, Marsh\u2019s Matthew Maffai and BMO Commercial Bank\u2019s Shawn Oden.
\n\u201cI think that given the political climate and the general macroeconomy, regardless if you’re foreign or domestic, most folks are taking a step back, a pause, and trying to understand the evolving landscape,\u201d Costa said.
\nEven as investors remain on the sidelines, Ni\u00f1o said\u00a0capital will eventually return, drawn by South Florida\u2019s appeal and the relative safety of the U.S. economy.
\nInvestors aren’t alone in the decision to lay low.
\nMany retailers\u00a0who sources their products\u00a0from China are hitting pause on lease commitments, with big-box tenants in particular waiting for more clarity before making moves,\u00a0Edens\u00a0Managing Director Nicole Shiman said.<\/p>\n

Bisnow\/Chloe Gallivan
\nFort Lauderdale Mayor Dean Trantalis, Pompano Beach Mayor Rex Hardin, Oakland Park Mayor Tim Lonergan, Hollywood Mayor Josh Levy and Broward County Mayor Michael Udine.
\nThe first quarter of this year saw the slowest pace of shopping center leasing since 2020, when pandemic lockdowns shuttered retail stores, which has created real challenges for operators.
\n\u201cThe threat of tariffs, or the reality of tariffs, has a real, legitimate impact on our retailers,\u201d Shiman said. \u201cWe’ve seen in the course of just a business plan and executing our business, there a lot of retailers out there who are saying, \u2018Pencils down.\u2019\u201d
\nUncertainty has become the biggest challenge in real estate, Ni\u00f1o said, because it’s a long-term investment and it’s hard to make decisions without a clear sense of where things are headed.
\n\u201cWhen there is a lot of uncertainty, people don’t make decisions or delay decisions,\u201d Ni\u00f1o said. \u201cAnd that’s become a reinforcing issue, because everybody is waiting for something, and nobody knows what we’re waiting for.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Even South Florida’s most active condo developer can’t avoid being caught in the middle of the changing-by-the-day tariff policies of the Trump administration. Related Group\u00a0bought $2M worth of tiles from Asia for one of its projects last month, swallowing a 25% tariff to ship them to the U.S., Related Group Executive Vice President Patrick Campbell […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":56570,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[756,723,731,721,728,717,715,737,725],"tags":[],"country":[767],"region":[678],"property_type":[755,711,699,697,727,709,706,734,713],"class_list":{"0":"post-58544","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-condo","8":"category-construction-renovation","9":"category-development-news","10":"category-investment","11":"category-luxury-estate","12":"category-proptech-platforms","13":"category-rental-market","14":"category-retail-space","15":"category-transaction-legal","16":"country-china","17":"region-asia","18":"property_type-condo","19":"property_type-construction-renovation","20":"property_type-development-news","21":"property_type-investment","22":"property_type-luxury-estate","23":"property_type-proptech-platforms","24":"property_type-rental-market","25":"property_type-retail-space","26":"property_type-transaction-legal"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58544"},{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=58544"},{"taxonomy":"region","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/region?post=58544"},{"taxonomy":"property_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.httppropeterrapropertynews.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/property_type?post=58544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}