Nicole Kushner Meyer and Laurent Morali

Kushner Companies has at least five multifamily projects under development in New Jersey and South Florida with a combined total of more than 6,500 units — and that’s just the beginning. 

While the company owns roughly 26,500 multifamily units in 14 states, there’s a reason it has chosen to develop in Jersey and Florida. “Those are two markets that my family has personally spent time in,” said Nicole Kushner Meyer, whose father and grandfather founded the company in the ’80s. (And who, it should be noted, is married to Joseph Meyer, chairman of Commercial Observer publisher Observer Media.) 

“An alpha for us is knowing that market as a local and really understanding where there’s value.”

Case in point: One of the Kushner projects is a two-building complex in Miami’s Edgewater with a total of 1,300 units at 1900 and 2000 Biscayne Boulevard. Since Kushner identified the site in 2018, the neighborhood went from underinvested to developer honey. But Edgewater was an easy target for someone who knew Miami, seeing as it was bounded by Downtown, Wynwood and the Miami Design District, said Meyer. 

In New Jersey, the company broke ground in June 2022 on Journal Square, a two-skyscraper, 2 million-square-foot project with 1,793 units planned. Shortly after, it closed on a $551 million loan for the project. “We managed to lock the costs of our construction some time ago, so we feel good about our basis,” said Laurent Morali. 

Slightly further south in Jersey, the company won approval in April 2023 to build 1,000 apartments on a 100-acre site occupied by the Monmouth Mall. “Where most people were seeing a dormant, dying mall, we were calling it Monmouth Village,” Morali said.

Other projects in those two markets include several garden-style communities throughout New Jersey, a 933-unit rental in Fort Lauderdale, and a 500-unit workforce housing development in Miami Gardens, plus a just-announced project in Wynwood.

In a rare non-multifamily project, Kushner is a partner on Dumbo Heights, a Brooklyn office property seeking a $425 million refinance. While the lending market is not kind at the moment, the building is anchored by long-term tenant Etsy, which extended its lease through 2039.

“Sometimes the best decisions you make are the ones you don’t make,” said Meyer. “We’re not afraid of rethinking or postponing a project if we’re not 100 percent sure about it.”