South Florida Luxury Condo Project Planned for Site Where Building Collapse Killed 98 People

A giant tarp, bottom, covers a section of rubble at the Champlain Towers South condo building, July 4, 2021, in Surfside, Fla. Lynne Sladky/AP Photo

SURFSIDE, Fla.—A Dubai-based developer plans to build a 12-story luxury condominium project on the South Florida site where a building collapsed in 2021, killing 98 people.

DAMAC International said Tuesday that it planned to build The Delmore on the site where the Champlain Towers South partially collapsed in Surfside, Florida, outside Miami in June 2021. Construction has already started and the project is expected to be finished in 2029, the company said in a news release.

The building with staggered floors designed by Zaha Hadid Architects will have 37 “mansions” with units averaging 7,000 square feet. The price of a four-or-five-bedroom unit will start at $15 million, and the project will include a private restaurant, residential butlers, a wellness spa and other resort-style amenities, according to the company.

“We have been focused on delivering an ultra-luxury product to the South Florida market that is unlike anything the area has seen previously,” Jeffery Rossely, senior vice president of development for DAMAC International, said in the statement.

The news release makes no mention of the tragedy.

What Happened

In June 2021, the 12-story, 136-unit oceanfront condo building came down with a thunderous roar, leaving a giant pile of rubble and claiming 98 lives—one of the deadliest structure collapses in U.S. history. Only two teenagers and a woman survived the collapse, while others escaped from the portion of the building that initially stood.

A judge in 2023 approved a settlement topping $1 billion for victims of the Champlain Towers South collapse. The money comes from 37 different sources, including insurance companies, engineering firms and a luxury condominium whose recent construction next door is suspected of contributing to structural damage. None of the parties admitted any wrongdoing.

The cause of the collapse remains under investigation by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

The Investigation

National Institute of Standards and Technology investigators told an advisory panel that tests show that some of the steel-reinforced concrete columns at Champlain Towers South were half the strength they should have been and were not up to construction standards in 1980 when the 12-story tower was built. The steel in some columns had become moderately to extremely corroded, weakening them further.

Investigators have also confirmed eyewitness reports that the pool deck fell into the garage four to seven minutes before the beachside tower collapsed.

Champlain Towers South had a long history of maintenance problems, and shoddy construction techniques were used in the early 1980s. Other possible factors include sea level rise caused by climate change and damage caused by saltwater intrusion.

Legislation

After the collapse, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law new regulations requiring condo associations for buildings with three or more stories to file an inspection report focused on structure, maintenance and expected costs for repairs or renovations.

The regulations require associations to have sufficient reserves to cover major repairs and to survey reserves every decade. Because of the law, older condos—found largely in South Florida, according to state records — face hefty increases to association payments to fund the reserves and repair costs.