In this episode of The Peter Zalewski Show™ podcast, host Peter Zalewski interviews financier Jim Fried of Sandstone Realty Advisors about the condo construction financing environment in South Florida.

The weekly podcast The Peter Zalewski Show features interviews with South Florida business leaders focused on real estate, finance and the economy.

The program - hosted by Peter Zalewski of the Miami Condo Investing Club™ - is broadcast live every Wednesday at 4 pm (Miami time) at MiamiCondo.Club and on social media sites.

The objective of the show is to deliver straight talk, share institutional knowledge and provide data-driven analysis on the macro and micro economic forces shaping the tricounty South Florida region of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach.

Tune in every Wednesday at 4 PM (EST) at MiamiCondo.Club or on Peter Zalewski’s social media accounts to watch the free live broadcasts.

Episode Overview

In the Nov. 19, 2025, episode of “The Peter Zalewski Show” podcast, host Peter Zalewski interviewed Jim Fried, the founder and president of Sandstone Realty Advisors who hosts the FriedOnBusiness podcast, about the condo construction financing environment in South Florida.

Despite a reported slowdown in condo presales—the essential driver for new projects—the financing spigot for new development remains open across the tricounty South Florida region of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach.

“The money’s out there,” said Fried, a veteran financier with more than 30 years of experience in South Florida. “You have to be an experienced developer. You have to have some of your own skin in the game.”

Beneath this financing availability lies a tougher reality: the market appears to have entered a new phase of the real estate cycle marked by stricter lending standards, rising costs and heightened lender scrutiny.

Topping it off, condo investor sentiment has pulled back from the buying frenzy of the last few years that was fueled by the post-pandemic world.

Preconstruction condo sales—which require buyers to prepay deposits of 50 percent for units that will not be completed for months or even years from now—have slowed noticeably.

This shift follows a dramatic reversal from 2021 when work-from-home policies triggered an in-migration wave to South Florida from high-cost states such as California, Illinois and New York.

The allure of tax breaks, attractive weather and comparatively affordable real estate sent buyers flooding into the South Florida condo market.

Buyers came rushing in and snapped up existing condo inventory, pushing prices to record highs.

This phenomenon prompted developers to launch new projects to capitalize on the strong demand.

The developers seeking financing now are those who entered the market during the later stages of this building boom.

Many of the initial wave of projects successfully moved from presales to completion, with another generation of developments now launching presales.

But that momentum slowed sharply, as rising interest rates and economic headwinds took hold.

By 2025, factors including tariff impacts from Liberation Day, a new U.S. immigration policy and a weakening job market added enough strain to the market that even a couple of recent interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve have had minimal effect on the South Florida condo market.

Compounding the challenges, many companies rescinded remote work policies, calling employees back to offices in Silicon Valley, Wall Street and beyond.

This created an overhang of condo supply just as the buyer pool thinned.

The South Florida developers who are trying to build glass towers on prime waterfront sites now face tougher lending hurdles amid a growing inventory of resale condos that has pushed the tricounty region into a buyers market.

The lenders that are willing to finance new condo towers require clear evidence of condo development expertise and a significant personal financial commitment before approving loans.