Unhappy Split: Developer Bermello Sues Partner in Brickell-Area Project Over Relationship with Contractor, Fate of Residences

The Daily Business Review chronicles a dispute between Miami architect-developer Willy Bermello and national apartment investor Summit Properties. In a lawsuit filed in Miami-Dade Circuit Court in August, Bermello and his Miami partners allege that North Carolina-based Summit and a subsidiary "breached their fiduciary duty to the project, hijacked the development and steered the construction contract for the project to a builder that caused severe cost overruns."

Bermello's attorney Alan Kluger, a founding member of Kluger, Peretz, Kaplan & Berlin P.L., explains in the article that the partners of the Brickell View development understood that they would act upon market conditions to create "maximum profitability." According to Kluger, "They said no [to the condos] and that's when the wars started." In addition, KPKB attorney Michael Landen told the Review that Brickell View L.L.C. could not be held responsible for the cost overruns because they were due to the contractor's inefficiency.