Renovation Contractor in Bay Harbor Islands, FL

Bay Harbor Islands, Florida

Bay Harbor Islands is two islands in Biscayne Bay with a split that was planned from the start. The West Island is zoned for single-family homes only. The East Island holds the apartment and condo buildings, the small business district along Kane Concourse, Town Hall and the school.

This is where we did one of our most instructive projects: the Bay Harbor apartment, a full gut of a condo unit in an occupied building. We handled the board approval, reserved the elevator, worked off a shared riser, levelled the floor and re-ran the services, and we also did the interior design. Everything below comes from that kind of work.

What makes Bay Harbor different is time. The Town allows construction only from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekdays, and it fines violations heavily. A project that would take a certain number of weeks elsewhere needs a schedule built for a shorter working day here.

Renovating an apartment on the East Island

The East Island has one of the largest concentrations of mid-century Miami Modern architecture in the country, with buildings by Morris Lapidus, Henry Hohauser and Charles McKirahan. In 2014 the National Trust for Historic Preservation named it one of America’s most endangered historic places because of redevelopment pressure. Many owners love these buildings for their proportions and light, and they are also old enough to need careful work.

On our Bay Harbor project, the sequence was what you would expect in a building of this kind, and it is worth knowing in advance:

• Board approval first. Nothing starts until the association signs off on the scope, the insurance and the schedule.
• Elevator reservations. Demolition debris and materials move only in booked windows, which have to fit inside the Town’s weekday hours.
• Shared risers. Plumbing ties into lines that serve neighbors above and below, so shutdowns are coordinated with management.
• Floor levelling. New large-format tile or wood will not sit flat on an uneven slab, so levelling is part of the plan, not an extra.
• Services re-run. In a full gut, we replace the electrical and plumbing inside the unit while the walls are open.

Because we did the interior design on that project as well as the build, we think about these buildings as a whole. In a mid-century apartment, the original window walls, ceiling heights and room proportions are usually the reason the owner bought it. Our approach is to modernize the kitchen, bathrooms and systems completely and keep the architecture readable, rather than covering it with finishes that could belong to any new tower.

Buildings of three habitable stories or more are also subject to Florida’s milestone inspection rules, and a mid-century building is well past the 30-year mark. If the association is in a repair cycle, your renovation needs to fit around it. See our guide to milestone inspections for condo owners and our condo renovation page.

Houses on the West Island

On an island, many single-family lots front the water, and West Island owners tend to want one of two things: a luxury renovation of the existing house, or a rebuild. Either way, the Town treats the outside of the house as a public matter. Additions, awnings, doors, driveways, fences, paint, signs and windows all need review by the Town Planner, the Design Review Board, or both.

Check your flood zone before you design anything. Miami-Dade’s flood zone map shows each lot’s designation, and AE and VE zones carry mandatory flood insurance. A house in one of those zones that is improved by half its market value or more is treated as a substantial improvement and has to meet floodplain rules for new construction. We cover the details in our article on the FEMA 50% rule.

What the 9-to-6 rule means for your schedule

A 9 a.m. start and a 6 p.m. stop give a crew 45 hours a week, with no Saturday catch-up day for construction. Interior repair and maintenance inside a dwelling is allowed on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., but only if no noise is audible outside the unit. Demolition, tile cutting and drilling into concrete do not meet that test.

We plan deliveries, inspections and noisy phases into the weekday window and keep quiet finish work for the days it suits. It is the honest way to give a Bay Harbor owner a realistic renovation timeline.