Two supertalls, one developer, one conceptual artist, a few blocks apart. The desk at Miami Dossier reads the only things that actually differ: the register and the unit mix.
Written by the desk at Miami Dossier, which holds developer material on both buildings and represents neither, for readers who have narrowed it to these two. All comparisons.
This is the rarest kind of comparison in Miami: two buildings that share the developer, the conceptual artist, the neighbourhood and the height. Almost every variable that usually decides a purchase is held constant. What is left is the brand register and the unit mix.
Both are Property Markets Group supertalls in Downtown Miami with Carlos Ott drawing the silhouette, both carry a hotel below the residences, and both are large buildings with several hundred homes. Both are delivering into a downtown that is still being built around them, which is a shared horizon risk and should be priced as one.
Both are height plays. The altitude is an entitlement position the rest of the coast cannot copy, and the same developer has now secured it twice a few blocks apart. Neither is the answer for a buyer who wants a small building or a quiet lobby.
The register. Waldorf Astoria is formal hospitality with a century behind it, managed by Hilton, with Peacock Alley and a service platform built for people who want the building run around them. Delano is the name that in 1995 invented the lifestyle hotel on Collins Avenue, operated here with Ennismore and Accor, with a public observation deck, a sky restaurant and a sky pool near the top. One is a grand hotel. The other is a scene, on purpose.
The homes. Waldorf Astoria runs from furnished junior suites to four bedrooms. Delano's released collection runs from studios up to three bedrooms, every one fully finished, with furnished suites in select lines, and larger residences are expected in later releases. A household that needs four bedrooms today has them at Waldorf Astoria, and should ask what Delano has opened before ruling it out.
The disclosure. Delano's brochure states plainly that the brand licence can be terminated and the building would then lose the name. That is true of most branded residences and is rarely written so directly. It is not a mark against the building. It is a reason to read the licence terms in both towers rather than assume.
Ask whether you want to be looked after or to be somewhere. A buyer who wants staff, quiet and formality chooses Waldorf Astoria within minutes. A buyer who wants the observation deck, the sky pool and a building with energy chooses Delano just as fast.
Then count bedrooms, and then sit in both lobbies. If the household needs four bedrooms today, Waldorf Astoria has them released. If the appeal is the observation deck and a building with energy in it, that settles it the other way.
Your situation is specific. Tell the desk in one message and we will say what applies to you, what does not, and who to speak with.
Your situation is specific. Tell the desk in one message and we will say what applies to you, what does not, and who to speak with.
Waldorf Astoria carries a three-note series at Miami Dossier. Delano is new to coverage and carries a dossier. This is the comparative read.
Waldorf Astoria if you want to be looked after, want the formal register and the century-old name, or need four bedrooms already released.
Delano if you want the same altitude with energy, a finished home from a studio up to three bedrooms, and a building with a public observation deck and a sky pool on top of it.
Most of the people who bring this comparison to the desk at Miami Dossier are not only choosing between buildings. They are moving to Miami from New York, California, London, Bogotá, Mexico City or São Paulo, or adding a Miami position to a portfolio held elsewhere, and the building question sits inside a larger one: how to buy new construction here, how to hold it, and what changes when you do.
The desk keeps short notes on the parts that come up every week: how buying preconstruction in Miami actually works, what a normal deposit schedule looks like, whether you need to be in Miami to buy, whether a foreign buyer can get a mortgage, what taxes a foreign buyer pays on a Miami condo, what happens if a developer delivers late, and the Florida state income tax question. For buyers arriving from a specific market there are notes for Bogotá, Mexico City and London.
Read the ones that apply, then bring the rest to the desk at Miami Dossier. It usually takes one conversation to see which of these fits, or whether neither does.
This page is general information for people considering Miami, written by a real estate desk, not by a law or accounting firm. Nothing here is legal, tax, immigration or investment advice, and it is not a substitute for advice on your own circumstances. Rules change, treaties differ by country, and the right answer for one family is the wrong answer for another.
Figures and building details are compiled from developer documents held by the desk at Miami Dossier and from public filings. They are approximate, subject to change, and anything material should be confirmed against the current developer release before you rely on it. Where the desk at Miami Dossier does not know something, the page says so.
Speak with your own attorney and CPA before you commit to anything. If you do not have one who works with international buyers in Florida, the desk is glad to recommend an attorney, a CPA or an adviser suited to your situation, and to sit in the first conversation so that nothing is lost in translation.
Structure, financing, currency, timing, the right building and the right line: the desk works through these questions with international buyers every week. What this page cannot do is know your position. Tell us the shape of it and we will say plainly which of these fits, which does not, and what we would want to see before anyone commits.