The W South Beach has to deal with four angry NFL players. The player have filed four separate lawsuits against the developers of the Residences at W South Beach. All four put down deposits on condos back in 2006 and 2007 but want that money back.
According to South Florida Business Journal, the players involved are DeAngelo Hall and Jammal Brown (both of the Washington Redskins), St. Carnell "Cadillac" Williams (of the St. Louis Rams) and Keiwan Ratliff (formerly of the Cincinnati Bangles, but now playing in the USFL). All four are being represented by local attorney Aaron Resnick.
All four had put down deposits on the swanky residences at the W back in 2006 and 2007. They ponied up between $182,000 and $194,000 each. Of course, the bottom of the real estate market fell out soon after, and all four claim they had problems closing when they found that more than 30 liens had been placed on the units. They asked to pull out of the deals, but the developers, 2201 Collins Fee LLC, refused.
The four also claimed they were lead to believe that the developers of the residential properties was Starwood Hotels & Resorts, the managers of the hotel portion of the W. The weren't aware that if Starwood pulled out of the branding deal, which, to be clear, they have not, that the condos would use the W branding.
"The defendant, 2201 Collins, used a sophisticated scheme to lure buyers to the project by using the W name as bait, only to sell them a unit that was not, in fact, a W unit," reads the suit.
Problems are nothing new for the developers. Less than half of the 408 condo units have been sold, and they've been sued by several buyers before.
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