Development Ideas Abound for Strategically-Located Watson Island

Key to developing Miami’s Watson Island is acceptance by the Port of Miami of a proposal by Abramson & Associates, a Boston real estate advisory firm. The firm recommends using land on the island’s southern edge for a new cruise-ship terminal.

In the first phase, the Port would lease 3.62 acres to build a $40 million facility to accommodate up to four ships. Base rent would be nearly $800,000 a year. That figure is arrived at by applying an 8% rate to an attributed $65 psf target value of the land.

That same target value would be used to project roughly $750,000 in annual rent for 3.33 acres of land farther west on which a second terminal would eventually rise at a cost of $45 million.