Casa Grande South Beach

What the county records at 834 Ocean Drive

The Miami-Dade County Property Appraiser holds 47 folios at 834 Ocean Drive, all in one declaration, CASA GRANDE CONDO. The common-element shares close at 100.0200%, so the pull is complete.

Those 47 folios are not 47 apartments, and getting this wrong would distort every figure on the page. Seven of them are parking spaces — units SP-1 to SP-7, between 130 and 150 square feet, assessed at about $15,650 each. The county classifies them as residential condominium exactly like the apartments, and their legal descriptions contain no parking keyword at all; only their size gives them away. Two more folios are retail. That leaves 38 apartments.

It is a practical point as well as a methodological one: parking at this building is deeded separately and can be bought and sold on its own. If you are looking here, establish early whether a space comes with the apartment.

The 38 homes run 550 to 2,010 square feet, median 660, in tightly repeated plans — 570, 610, 620 and 780 sq ft at four units each. The mix is eight studios, 24 one-bedrooms, four two-bedrooms and two three-bedrooms. All 38 are classified RESIDENTIAL — TOTAL VALUE : CONDOMINIUM — RESIDENTIAL; there is no lodging-classified folio anywhere in this declaration.

For 2026 the county assesses the apartments at $15,739,132, a median of $342,175 across a range of $301,703 to $1,134,787.

Thirty-five apartments, thirty-five gains

The record holds 106 qualified transactions stretching back to 1993, which is deep enough to follow individual apartments through several owners. Three portfolio deeds have been excluded, including one of $8,500,000 across three folios in 2019 that would otherwise publish as a single-apartment sale.

The conversion happened in December 1997: 27 apartments sold that month for $3,721,300 in total, at a median of $192 per square foot, in a range of $168 to $375.

Twenty-six of those 27 buyers have since sold. Every one of them gained.

Widening to every apartment in the building with two or more qualified sales on record — 35 of them, not just the 1997 cohort — gives the same answer: 35 up, none down, median +153.1%.

Some individual histories show the shape of it. Unit 402, 900 square feet, sold for $320,000 in 1993, $660,000 in 2011, $745,000 in 2020 and $1,120,000 in April 2025 — a rise from $356 to $1,244 per square foot across 32 years, and the highest per-foot figure in the building’s record. Unit 507, 820 square feet, went from $168,800 in 1997 to $700,000 in 2007, a gain of 314.7%. Unit 306 has traded five times since 1997 and is up 263.7%.

I want to be careful about what this does and does not mean. It does not mean this building is a better building than The Carlyle. It means the 1997 entry price — a median of $192 a foot — was low enough that almost nothing could go wrong, while The Carlyle’s 2006 entry of up to $1,370 a foot was high enough that almost nothing could go right. The record here is mostly a fact about when people bought, not about what they bought. A buyer today is entering at neither of those prices.

What is the building doing now?

Seven qualified sales across four years against 38 apartments is roughly one home in 22 per year, with nothing at all in 2024. The per-foot medians — $670, then $682, then $636 — sit within a narrow band, but on two, four and one sales respectively. That is nowhere near enough to establish a direction and I am not going to draw one.

What the recent record does support is a level: the building is trading around $636 to $682 per square foot, with a single 2025 outlier at $1,244 that set the building record. The median last-sale year across all 38 apartments is 2014, so many owners here are holding gains that have never been tested by a sale.

Who this building suits, and who it does not

This suits a buyer who wants an Ocean Drive address at a genuinely accessible price. A median assessed value of $342,175 and recent sales from $375,000 to $460,000 put this among the cheapest ways onto this street, and the apartments are real one-bedrooms rather than studios.

It suits you badly if you are extrapolating from the history above. The +168.8% belongs to people who bought at $192 a square foot in 1997. You would be buying at roughly $650. The record is evidence that this building holds value well; it is not a forecast, and nothing on this page should be read as one.

Liquidity is moderate by the standards of this section — better than Boulan or Bentley Beach, well behind YotelPAD — but one blank year in four is a reminder that the market here is thin.

On short-term rental: no folio in this declaration carries a lodging classification, and that settles nothing either way. Florida’s state preemption, the City of Miami Beach’s zoning and licensing rules and the condominium declaration decide it together, and Miami Beach enforces hard. Confirm all three with your own lawyer before relying on rental income.

If you are selling here, you are in an unusually strong evidential position: the building has never recorded a repeat sale at a loss, and you can show that. Price against the 2023–26 per-foot band rather than against the 2025 record sale, which was a larger apartment at a figure nothing else here has approached. And confirm whether your parking space is a separate folio — if it is, it is a separate asset and should be priced as one.

Casa Grande — Frequently Asked Questions

How many apartments are there at Casa Grande?

Thirty-eight. The county records 47 folios in the declaration, but seven of those are parking spaces of 130 to 150 square feet and two are retail units. The parking folios are classified as residential condominium exactly like the apartments, so a count taken straight from the classification would say 45.

Does parking come with an apartment here?

Not automatically. Seven parking spaces are held as their own folios, assessed at about $15,650 each, and can be bought and sold separately from the apartments. Establish early whether a particular unit includes one.

Have apartments here gone up in value?

Every one that has sold twice has. All 35 apartments with a repeat sale on record are up, at a median of +153.1%, and not one has resold at a loss. Of the 26 buyers from the December 1997 conversion who have since sold, all 26 gained, at a median of +168.8%.

What do apartments here cost now?

Recent qualified sales run roughly $375,000 to $460,000, at $636 to $682 per square foot. The building record is $1,120,000 for a 900 sq ft home in April 2025, which works out at $1,244 per square foot — well above anything else in the record.

Does that history mean this is a good investment now?

It does not follow, and I would not present it that way. The 1997 buyers entered at a median of $192 per square foot; a buyer today enters at roughly $650. What the record supports is that this building has held its value unusually consistently. It is not a forecast.

How big are the apartments?

From 550 to 2,010 square feet, median 660. The mix is eight studios, 24 one-bedrooms, four two-bedrooms and two three-bedrooms, in tightly repeated plans of 570, 610, 620 and 780 square feet.

Can I rent a unit here on a short-term basis?

The county record does not answer that. No folio in this declaration carries a lodging classification, and that establishes nothing either way — a use code is a tax category, not a permission. Florida’s state preemption, City of Miami Beach zoning and licensing, and the condominium declaration decide it. Take your own legal advice.

Interested in selling at Casa Grande South Beach?

Learn more about selling your condo at Casa Grande South Beach with Josh Stein. 

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