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1667-7 Fisher Islandmmmmmw TUE DEC 11 1984 ED: FINAL SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: 1B LENGTH: 35. 67" LONG ILLUST: photo: William Rebozo, construction crew ; map: Fisher Island condos SOURCE: GEOFFREY TOMB Herald Staff Writer DATELINE: MEMO: see also FISHER ISLAND' S HISTORY CONDO GLUT CLOUDS FUTURE OF EXCLUSIVE FISHER ISLAND Once an empty spit of land left mostly to hawks, snakes and Australian pines, Fisher Island is being bulldozed into the future as THE exclusive address in Miami, a $500 million island community for 3, 000 residents that can be reached only by boat. But before they get there, Fisher Island could become a dream buster. Because Fisher Island is now only a facade. It resembles a movie set on the back lot of MGM. It is empty when the workers go home. No one lives there. Developers estimate that 25 people have put up fully refundable deposits for units there. But officially, not a single unit has been sold. The development has already cost $85 million. Another $45 million will be spent in the next year. Interest on loans is costing developers $30, 000 a day. "That ' s heavy bucks. How are they ever going to recoup that? They are living in a dream world, " said Ramon Fisch, past president of the Miami Beach Board of Realtors. "The timing is unfortunate. The condominium market in South Florida, and in Dade in particular, is the worst it has been in 10 years, " said Charles Kimball, South Florida real estate analyst. "There will probably be very few sales there next year or in the next two years. Inventories of unsold condominium units are at the highest levels in local history. There are 12 ,000 units on hand in Dade alone, and most all of them are in luxury buildings, " said Kimball. "I 'm not going to panic or get really concerned for another year, " said tiâś“William Rebozo, project manager for Island Developers Ltd. , which is building the community around a onetime hideaway of William K. Vanderbilt. "I think we are in a different league, completely different. There is no doubt in my mind that we will do real well once we get it going, " said Rebozo. "The luxury market is suffering, but it ' s not something that lasts forever, " he said. The first of the four-story condominium buildings should be finished by February. Residents will begin moving in by July, Rebozo predicted. This is phase one, the only phase so far, of a project of 1, 200 units. Rebozo, nephew of Key Biscayne banker and Richard Nixon confidant Charles "Bebe" Rebozo, believes he is offering more than just another fancy place to live. He talks of his island sanctuary as a life style, one combining a private community where the security-minded buyer can live in sight of but insulated from the downtown skyline to the west and the spray of the Atlantic Ocean to the east. A pair of 120-foot ferry boats will haul owners ' cars from the MacArthur Causeway. Six 40-foot launches will zip people into the city. Coffee and the newspaper in the mornings. Cocktails at night. Once on the 216-acre island, residents will be treated to parks with fish ponds, fountains, flowering bougainvillea, 17 tennis courts, a 10-acre marina for 86 boats, an aviary, strolling pheasants and quail, pools, a shopping center, a 60- room hotel and a private club inside the Vanderbilt estate, which has been restored. Condominium units, with prices that start at $400, 000 and go up to $1 million, will feature beamed ceilings, cedar closets and working fireplaces. "All our pipes are either cast iron or copper. The stairwells are tile. We are using solid marble. Units have the best cabinets money can buy, " said Rebozo, 46. Units are costing him $135 a square foot to build, twice the average price in Dade, he claimed. "That' s really choice stuff . It ' s not out of line in a good market. But this is not a good market. This is a really bad market, " said Fisch, who said he has no ill will toward the project. There is no quit in Rebozo, who fancies himself as king of his own island. Gatsby might be more accurate. Fisher Island has consumed him. He fished there as a boy and dreamed then of living on the island. In college, he drew plans to develop it. In 1968 he made his first bid to buy the island that was then owned by his uncle, who had Nixon as one of the investors . Then, Rebozo the nephew wanted to build a bridge from adjacent Virginia Key and plop 12 , 000 people on the island. By 1974 he scaled his dream down to 5, 000 units and a hotel for 1, 500 . Metro fought him and for two years Fisher Island appeared destined to be a public park. Rebozo fought back in court, and in 1977 he won. In 1979, he got backing from Mutual Benefit Life of Newark, N.J. , and the money started to pour like concrete. Roads and sewers went in. A four-acre nursery with $1 million worth of 15, 000 trees and 50, 000 plants was created. The marina was built. The ferry boats, at $2 million each, were bought. Today, 100 workers are employed directly by the developers. Two chefs fix Rebozo and prospects their lunch in the Beach Club, the former Vanderbilt pool pump house. Two men are paid $5 an hour and work all week doing nothing but edging lawns . "Fisher Island is not something you do tomorrow or the next day or in a year or two. We have already spent five years, and it will take us at least seven more to get finished. If it takes 10 more years, that' s not unrealistic. We are right on target, " said Rebozo. He claims "25 or 30 people, " mostly Dade residents, have put non-binding deposits on Fisher Island condominiums. The profile of his buyers is "wealthy, " "nouveau riche, " "in his 40s or 50s" and "somewhat venturesome, " said Rebozo. One prospect is Pat Larimore, a real estate broker with Merrill Lynch. She has paid $10, 000 to hold a two-bedroom unit on the top floor of the building now going up next to the marina. "It ' s a superb project, THE place in South Florida, " said Larimore. "Once people really see it and how it works, they will love it. " The "water transportation was a very big plus" for her, she said. "It would have sold out overnight if this were five years ago, " Larimore said. Rebozo has hired Hank Adams to be sales director. Adams, a man who used the words "knock your socks off" to describe the island, works in the former Vanderbilt electric power plant. "We are 300 yards from Miami Beach. But it might as well be 300 years, " Adams said. Advertising has appeared in Vogue, Town & Country, Architecture Digest and the in-flight magazines of Pan Am and Eastern airlines. A color brochure will appear in The Miami Herald and ads will run next month in The New York Times, Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. "This is not a shoe box condominium. You can't do it with one picture, " Rebozo said. Until he has a unit to show, sales will continue at their present slow pace, Rebozo predicted. "The smartest thing for them to do is to go as slowly as possible, " said analyst Kimball . "Ultimately when the condo market returns they will be prime. " Rebozo beams confidence. Word is spreading, he insists. There were 1,200 people on his list for a Nov. 17 tennis tournament, and the Orange Bowl Committee will hold a cocktail party for 800 there on Dec. 30 . "I just believe there are 1, 200 people out there who can afford to and will buy, " Rebozo said. "I 've spent too many years and too many dollars not to believe. " ADDED TERMS: major-story profile history cost finance and fisher-island END OF DOCUMENT.