Aria on the Bay

Four years of almost no movement at all

Qualified sales from the Miami-Dade County Property Appraiser record, counted 23 September 2026, arm’s-length transactions only.

$680, $685, $702, $687. Across four years the total movement in this building’s median price per square foot is 1.0%, and the widest gap between any two years is 3.2%.

The median sale price moves more: $700,000, $745,000, $702,500, $650,000. The 2026 figure reflects smaller homes selling (the median home sold is 1,038 square feet in 2026 to date against 1,171 in 2023), not a change in value. The per-foot figure adjusts for size, which is why it is the steadier measure and the one I lead with.

Why stability is the finding

It would be easy to read a flat table as an absence of news. It is the opposite, for one reason: this stability rests on 123 qualified sales.

Here, roughly one home in twenty-one changes hands every year.

A price that does not move, measured across 123 arm’s-length transactions in four separate years, is about as strong a statement as private-market data can make. It means:

• Your comparables are current and plentiful. There is essentially always a recent sale in the building to price against.
• Neither side has the upper hand from the trend. A buyer cannot argue values are collapsing, and a seller cannot argue they are climbing. Both claims are refuted by the same table.
• The record is steady. Across four years the median per-foot price has stayed within a 3.2% band.

Whether that is attractive depends entirely on what you want. It is close to ideal for an owner-occupier and unexciting for anyone underwriting appreciation.

A building with a very tall ceiling

The county record returns 652 folios at 488 NE 18th Street: 648 residential homes and four commercial units.

The mix is 301 one-bedrooms, 212 two-bedrooms, 133 three-bedrooms and two studios. That 133 is worth pausing on — a deep supply of genuine three-bedroom homes is unusual in this part of the market, where compact stock dominates. Heated area runs 706 to 4,238 square feet, with a median of 1,079.

The 2026 assessed values tell you this is really two buildings stacked together: they run $300,301 to $5,780,450, with a median of $568,436. The top is more than nineteen times the bottom.

That upper tier is real, not theoretical. The record sale is $7,500,000, recorded in January 2024 for the 4,238 square foot penthouse — and the same home traded at $4,600,000 and $4,500,000 in June 2018. The premium floors here transact, and they transact well above the building’s median.

This is also why the flat per-foot figure deserves its caveat: it describes the building as a whole. A 4,238 square foot penthouse and a 706 square foot one-bedroom do not necessarily move together, and with 123 sales spread across that range, the median is an average of two quite different markets.

Who this building suits

It suits an owner-occupier unusually well. Stable pricing, plentiful comparables, high turnover and a genuine supply of three-bedroom homes all show in the record here.

It suits a buyer underwriting appreciation poorly. Four years of county evidence says this building does not move. If your case for buying depends on the price rising, this record does not support it, and it rests on 123 qualified sales.

For an investor, the record shows liquidity rather than appreciation. One home in twenty-one trades each year, so both ends of a purchase can be priced against real, recent transactions rather than guesswork.

If you are selling here, the flat trend is neither friend nor enemy — it simply removes the argument from the conversation. Price against a recent comparable of your own floorplate. In this building, unusually, one almost certainly exists.

Interested in selling at Aria on the Bay?

Learn more about selling your condo at Aria on the Bay with Josh Stein.

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Edgewater Condo & Loft Buildings

Edgewater runs along Biscayne Bay between the Venetian Causeway and the Julia Tuttle. Every building below is covered in this series, with its own county sales record:

• 1800 Biscayne Plaza
• 1800 Club
• Bay House
• Biscayne Beach
• Blue Condominium
• Cite on the Bay
• City 24
• Edgewater Lofts
• Elysee Miami
• Gallery Art Condominium
• Gran Paraiso
• Icon Bay
• Moon Bay
• New Wave
• One Paraiso
• Onyx on the Bay
• Opera Tower
• Paraiso Bay
• Paramount Bay
• Platinum Condo
• Quantum on the Bay
• The Crimson
• The Grand Condos Miami
• Uptown Lofts