Brokerage tied to Coral Gables mayor nets $640K from property sale to embattled developer
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A small, politically connected brokerage tied to Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago received a $640,000 commission last year from the sale of a downtown Gables lot where embattled real estate developer Rishi Kapoor planned to build a luxury high-rise.
The payment, disclosed in corporate documents obtained by the Miami Herald, came in December as Kapoor’s Location Ventures scrambled to close on the $35.5 million purchase of the property, located at 1505 Ponce de Leon Blvd.
The commission went to Rosa Commercial Real Estate, a boutique brokerage owned by Lago’s business associate, former Hialeah Councilman Oscar De La Rosa.
State records list just five real estate agents whose licenses are registered with the brokerage — including the mayor of Hialeah, Lago and his chief of staff at Coral Gables City Hall.
Lago says he received no money from the deal and was not involved in the sale of the property to Location Ventures, whose business in neighboring Miami and payments to the mayor there, Francis Suarez, are currently under FBI investigation. Lago says his decision to “hang” his real estate license with the boutique firm in June of last year was merely a matter of paperwork, given that it is standard practice for real estate agents to work under a broker.
But Lago’s decision to join Rosa Commercial Real Estate last summer — and to quietly remain involved in the developer’s affairs at City Hall in the ensuing months — raises questions about how the brokerage became connected to the deal and the extent to which the mayor entangled his private business and public office with Kapoor.
State records show that Lago joined the small firm that would ultimately profit from Location Ventures’ purchase of the 1505 Ponce development site as Kapoor was seeking City Commission approval to build a 16-story residential tower there.
Weeks earlier, in late May of 2022, Lago and several associates had purchased a storefront directly across the street and then leased it to Location Ventures as a future sales center for roughly $12,400 a month. As the Herald previously reported, Lago said he and his partners were “approached by several potential tenants,” and the developer’s attorney said the company paid market rate.
The mayor disclosed the arrangement when he recused himself last summer from the first of several City Commission votes on the project, noting on June 28 that he had a “potential conflict.” Two days later, state records show, Lago registered his real estate license with Rosa Commercial Real Estate.
It is unclear who at the brokerage was compensated in the closing of 1505 Ponce, or how the boutique firm entered into Location Ventures’ orbit.
Four of the five real estate agents registered with the brokerage — Lago, Hialeah Mayor Esteban “Steve” Bovo, who is De La Rosa’s stepfather, land-use attorney William Riley and Lago’s chief of staff, Chelsea Granell — denied involvement. They also said they did not know who received the six-figure commission from the sale, or whether it was distributed among multiple people. A fifth real estate agent at the firm, Anthony Casas, could not be reached.
Location Ventures did not respond to the Herald’s request for comment.
City spokeswoman Martha Pantin said the mayor, who could not be reached in person or on his cell phone, would not answer questions about the brokerage.
“If you have questions regarding the transaction, suggest you reach out to Mr. De La Rosa,” she said in an email.
De La Rosa, who as the broker would be responsible for overseeing closings and divvying up commissions, did not respond to emailed questions from the Herald or attempts to reach him through his cell phone and at his office.
The relationship between De La Rosa and Lago — a registered real estate agent in Florida since 2006 — pre-dates the mayor’s move from a large brokerage called RESF to Rosa Commercial Real Estate. In 2021, Lago and De La Rosa were registered as managers for a company called Capitol Equity LLC. State records show it was administratively dissolved the following year.
‘A WIN-WIN FOR ALL PARTIES’
In public, Lago has maintained an arms-length relationship over the past year with Kapoor, who stepped down from a management role in Location Ventures last month amid mounting legal and financial woes.
Scrutiny of Location Ventures increased this summer after the Herald reported that the development firm was paying Mayor Suarez $10,000 monthly as a consultant at the same time that Suarez’s staff was helping Kapoor cut through red tape at City Hall to obtain permits for a $70 million project in Coconut Grove.
READ MORE: Former executive at firm that paid Suarez $170K says CEO improperly redirected loan funds
The FBI, Miami-Dade state attorney’s office and Miami-Dade ethics commission are looking into Suarez’s work for the developer.
Suarez and Kapoor say they have done nothing wrong, and that the mayor’s work for Location Ventures subsidiary URBIN was unrelated to City Hall. Suarez has said he was paid to help bring investors into Kapoor’s projects.
Under Florida ethics laws, elected officials are not allowed to use their official position “to secure a special privilege, benefit, or exemption” for themselves or others. The law also states that an elected official cannot accept compensation or “a thing of value” if the official knew or should have reasonably known that it was given to them to influence a vote or action carried out in their official capacity.
When pressed about his own financial relationship with Kapoor, Lago has stressed that he is a part-time mayor who makes his money in real estate, and that he recused himself from four votes last year on the developer’s business.
City emails, however, show that even after Lago disclosed that he was leasing his property to Kapoor, he continued to help the developer pursue his business at City Hall.
In October — months after Lago became Kapoor’s landlord and registered his license with Rosa Commercial Real Estate — the mayor met privately with Kapoor and City Manager Peter Iglesias.
Emails obtained through a public records request show the mayor, Kapoor and Iglesias met to discuss a city-owned parking lot that the developer wanted to purchase and include in a new project for the firm’s URBIN brand. Kapoor described the proposal as a “win-win for all parties” in emails organizing the meeting.
Weeks later, Iglesias would support the developer’s request to enter into formal negotiations, with the City Commission voting 4-0 in favor.
Lago, who recused himself from the vote, said in a written statement that he “facilitated” the meeting, describing it as an effort to benefit the city.
“The meeting was an attempt to negotiate a better price on behalf of the city for the Navarre Ave. site and was done in the best interests of Coral Gables,” Lago said.
Lago had met previously with Kapoor or Location Ventures employees on at least four other occasions, in 2018, 2021 and 2022, city records show. The developer’s internal meeting minutes also refer to another meeting between Kapoor, Lago and Iglesias in February of this year to discuss the Navarre Avenue parking lot.
Anthony Alfieri, founding director of the Center for Ethics and Public Service at the University of Miami School of Law, says abstaining from votes does not give the mayor free rein to assist Kapoor privately in City Hall.
Alfieri said that, to the extent that Lago is acting as a “de facto lobbyist for a private interest,” his conduct raises questions under Miami-Dade ethics laws about “whether he is exploiting his official position to secure special privileges now or in the future.”
He also expressed concern about whether any of Lago’s real estate investments have created a “substantial conflict between his private interests and the public interest.”
Iglesias, the city manager, said that during the October meeting about the Navarre Avenue parking lot, the mayor was not advocating for Kapoor, nor was he putting pressure on the administration to pursue a deal with Location Ventures. Iglesias said negotiations for the parking lot had ended.
“The mayor has never done anything that’s not in the best interest of the city,” said Iglesias. “That’s a fact. Never.”
‘HOPE TO POP THE BUBBLY BY HAPPY HOUR’
Lago’s contact in recent months with the developer wasn’t limited to the Navarre Avenue parking lot, according to Kapoor’s own correspondence.
In early December, when Location Ventures was scrambling to nail down required signatures from the City Attorney’s Office to obtain a $20 million loan and close on the 1505 Ponce property, Kapoor mentioned Lago in an email to investors.
“The Mayor had us meet the Assistant City Atty today at ~9a to get covenants signed for recording,” Kapoor wrote on Dec. 1, adding: “Hope to pop the bubbly by happy hour.”
Kapoor needed the city to sign off on the transfer of development rights, or TDRs, from nearby historic properties, which allowed the developer to build the project to the desired square-footage. The City Commission had approved the TDRs — with Lago abstaining — weeks earlier. But without the underlying covenants, the lender, Altamar Financial Group, wouldn’t provide the crucial loan, internal financial documents show.
READ MORE: Lender’s $15 million lawsuit is latest setback for developer with ties to Mayor Suarez
Nov. 30 was the 1505 Ponce closing deadline, which had already been pushed back from September, according to internal company records. That evening, Mario Garcia-Serra, a lobbyist for Location Ventures’ affiliate Location Acquisitions, emailed the city attorney and an assistant city attorney to set up a document-signing meeting.
“My apologies for an evening of ‘fire drills,’” Garcia-Serra wrote to the city’s legal staff shortly after 8 o’clock that night.
The next day, Dec. 1, Location Ventures obtained the signatures, with an assistant city attorney, Gustavo Ceballos, signing the documents. Garcia-Serra thanked the city for reviewing and signing off on the documents “on an expedited basis,” and a lawyer for the lender wrote that he appreciated Ceballos’ “intervention to assist” on the matter, city emails show.
The deal closed Dec. 2, according to a U.S. Housing and Urban Development settlement statement obtained by the Herald, netting the $640,000 commission for Rosa Commercial Real Estate. The commission was paid by the seller, Florida East Coast Realty, according to the document.
Kapoor did not include further details in his email about the purported interaction with Lago regarding the signatures, but the firm’s lobbyist, Garcia-Serra, said in an interview that, as far as he knew, the mayor wasn’t involved.
Likewise, in an email statement, Deputy City Attorney Stephanie Throckmorton said the City Attorney’s Office has “no recollection that the Mayor was involved with our office’s execution of those TDR covenats” for 1505 Ponce.
Through the city spokeswoman, the mayor denied having any role in finalizing the paperwork with the city attorney’s office.
“He did not set up that meeting,” said Pantin, whose son Les Pantin was registered to lobby in Coral Gables on behalf of Location Acquisitions until last week.
As for the 1505 Ponce project, it is the subject of nearly $290,000 in liens from architects who say they have yet to be paid in full for their work. The lot remains vacant, as does the storefront that Location Ventures leased from Lago and the mayor’s business partners, one of whom is the cousin and past political adviser of Suarez, Miami’s Mayor.
Miami Herald staff writers Sarah Blaskey, Joey Flechas and Catherine Odom contributed to this report.
