Developer forges ahead on $35M apartment project

SARASOTA — Tampa-based Forge Capital Partners has closed on the $5.8 million sale of a 2.7-acre parcel just north of downtown Sarasota.

Forge Capital, in connection with a partner firm, Tampa-based Framework Group, plans to turn the Fruitville Road site into a 228-unit apartment complex. The $35 million project, planned at five stories, is being called Sarasota Flats.

Sarasota Flats is one of at least seven new residential projects in the works in the area north of downtown, called the Rosemary District. It's the second project to proceed under the Rosemary Residential Overlay District, a special zoning option that allows for up to 75 units per acre in certain areas of Rosemary. The nearby CitySide development, which broke ground earlier this year, uses the overlay district.

The Sarasota Flats property last sold for $3.6 million in 2004.

“It is exciting for a land sale to be part of the energizing of the Rosemary Overlay District,” says Michael Saunders & Co. Realtor Susan Goldstein, who represented Framework. “It also will be offering a product that is currently unavailable in the downtown area.”