Hollywood Arts Residences

The city owns this land

On 26 August 2026 I looked up 1301 South Ocean Drive in the Broward County Property Appraiser’s record. It returns two parcels, and the owner of both is the CITY OF HOLLYWOOD.

• Folio 514224010011 — classified “Municipal Administration Bldg.”, built 1970, 17,130 square feet, zoned GU — Government Use District. 2026 just value $8,270,750.
• Folio 514224020013 — classified “Parking lot”, also zoned GU — Government Use District. 2026 just value $5,272,440.

Neither parcel has been conveyed since 31 December 1974, and the only transaction on either record is a $100 title change on that date. Combined, the county puts the public’s land here at $13,543,190.

The site is known locally as Azalea Terrace, roughly four acres of oceanfront. In 2022 the City of Hollywood entered a public-private partnership under which Related Group holds a 99-year ground lease over it. The developer has a long-term leasehold interest in public land; it does not own the ground.

That single fact reframes everything else on this page. Ordinary pre-construction risk is about whether a developer can finance and build. Here there is an additional layer: a municipal government is the landlord, the terms sit in a development agreement that the commission can amend — and did amend, in May 2026 — and the disposition of public parkland is a political question as much as a commercial one.

What was actually approved in May 2026

The plan approved in 2022 was a 26-storey, all-condominium building. That is not what is now approved.

On Wednesday 22 May 2026, the Hollywood City Commission voted 5–2 to amend the development agreement. The amended programme is:

• 124 market-rate condominiums
• 86 workforce-housing rentals — 40% of the 210 homes
• Workforce units let at below-market rents to households earning up to 120% of area median income, which in Broward County is $106,440 for a one-person household, with priority for police officers, firefighters, city employees, hospital workers and teachers
• A Hollywood Culture and Community Center that Related agreed to build on the site, alongside the residential building

Height and design elements are pending a finalised site plan. Commissioner Caryl Shuham was among the two votes against.

So the figures this page carried — 30 storeys, 146 residences, 1,910 to 3,706 square feet, from around $750,000 — match neither the superseded 2022 scheme nor the amended 2026 one. If you are considering this building, the number of homes you would be sharing it with is 210, not 146, and 86 of them are rentals rather than owner-occupied condominiums. That is a materially different building to live in and to resell in, and it is not a judgement about workforce housing — it is simply what the approved programme is.

The approval route, and why it matters

The procedural history is short and it is the best available guide to delivery risk.

In February 2026 the Broward County Planning Council designated the site a “community facility” rather than the “medium-high 25” residential designation being sought. In March 2026, reporting records that Hollywood’s mayor did not succeed in persuading the county land-use panel to change that position.

The amended May 2026 scheme qualifies for expedited approval under the Live Local Act, Florida’s affordable-housing statute, which as amended permits qualifying developments that include workforce housing on municipal property. Adding the 86 workforce rentals is what brings the project within it.

The scheme has drawn sustained public opposition. Around thirty residents spoke against the amendment at the May commission meeting, raising storm vulnerability and rising sea levels. Drew Martin of the Sierra Club’s Loxahatchee Group said of the statute: “It’s just a loophole for developers, that’s all Live Local is.” Separately, Hollywood’s city charter allows voters to challenge a commission decision of this kind by presenting signatures from 15% of the city’s registered voters to the City Clerk.

I am reporting this, not taking a side. Whether a condominium tower belongs on public beachfront is a question for Hollywood’s residents and their elected representatives, and I have no view I would put on this page. But if you are contemplating putting a deposit down, the fact that the entitlement path ran through a contested county designation, a statutory workaround and a divided 5–2 vote — with a charter mechanism for challenge still available — is exactly the kind of thing that determines whether and when a building gets delivered. It belongs in your assessment.

I will not predict the outcome, and you should be wary of anyone who does.

The question to ask before any other

Here is the question I would want answered in writing before discussing anything else about this building.

If the City of Hollywood owns the land and Related holds a 99-year ground lease, what exactly would a condominium buyer own?

There are structures in which a buyer takes fee-simple title to a unit; there are others in which a buyer takes an interest tied to a leasehold on the underlying land. These are materially different assets. A leasehold interest affects:

• Mortgage financing. Lenders treat leasehold condominiums differently, and some will not lend at all, or will require the lease term to extend well beyond the mortgage term.
• Resale. Your buyer pool is narrower, and the value behaves differently as the remaining lease term shortens.
• Ground rent. Whether it is payable, by whom, how it escalates and how it enters the association budget.
• What happens at the end of the term, in year 99.

I do not know how this specific project is structured and I am not going to guess. The public record I have established tells you the city owns the land and the developer holds a long ground lease; it does not tell you how residences will be conveyed. Ask for the answer in writing, and have a Florida real estate attorney read the ground lease and the proposed declaration before you rely on any of it. If a salesperson cannot answer this question precisely, that in itself is your answer for now.

What to establish before you commit

• What you would own — fee simple or a leasehold interest — and, if leasehold, the ground rent, the escalation, and the position at the end of 99 years.
• Whether your lender will finance it, confirmed by the lender, before you rely on a mortgage.
• The current approved unit mix and site plan. 210 homes with 86 rentals is the approved programme; height and design are not yet finalised.
• How the workforce rental component is managed and budgeted, and whether amenities and the association budget are shared across all 210 homes or separated.
• The status of every outstanding approval, including the county land-use position and any charter challenge, with dates.
• Escrow terms and your remedies if the project does not proceed — and given everything above, read these particularly carefully.
• Do not treat any quoted price as firm. There is no finalised site plan, so there is no settled product to price.

Hollywood Beach is a genuinely attractive market and a Related building there would be a serious proposition. But a buyer needs to know that this one sits on public land under a ground lease, that its programme was rewritten in May 2026 to include 86 rentals, that its entitlement ran through a contested county designation and a 5–2 vote, and that a charter challenge mechanism exists. None of that was on this page before today, and all of it should be in front of anyone thinking about a deposit.

Considering 1301 South Ocean Drive?

Before anything else, you need to know whether you would own your home outright or an interest in a 99-year lease on city land — and what is actually approved today. I will get you the ground lease, the current site plan status and the outstanding approvals in writing.

ASK JOSH ABOUT HOLLYWOOD BEACH