While waterfront neighborhoods like South Beach, Surfside and Sunny Isles Beach are soaking up attention from developers this cycle, some industry insiders say Miami’s barrier islands still have neighborhoods ripe for the picking.
Architect Markus Frankel says Bay Harbor Islands is one of those places. His firm Frankel Benayoun Architects is designing a number of the boutique projects there, and he says Bay Harbor Islands is one of South Florida’s most undervalued waterfront communities.
And like all “best kept secrets,” someone eventually spills the beans. At least 26 new projects are in some stage of development on the neighborhood’s two islands, many of them boutique condo buildings and townhouses.

By Sean Stewart-Muniz

The Real Deal