Pre-Construction Homes in South Florida

You buy a home before it exists. The agreement with the developer is signed while the building is unfinished, sometimes before any digging starts. Deposits go in on the schedule your contract sets. You close once the building is done and cleared for occupancy, possibly years after signing.

Your deposits follow the schedule in your contract, and escrow holds the money. Picture a contract with 10 deposit dates: each one is mapped out for you, and you also hear how escrow keeps your funds while the building goes up.

Yes, if it's a new condo from the developer and you cancel in writing within 15 days. Florida law starts that clock at signing or at receipt of the required documents, whichever happens last. Cancel in time, and the deposit is refunded. After that, the contract's terms decide, so read its cancellation and default clauses closely.

It depends on the purchase agreement. That document gives an estimated completion date, may set an outside date, and spells out what follows if the developer misses it. Go through those clauses with a broker before signing: they decide your options when the schedule slips.

Often, yes. Many foreign buyers acquire Florida property, new builds included. The exception to watch is Chapter 692 of the Florida Statutes. It restricts individuals whose domicile is in Syria, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Russia, China or Venezuela (the Maduro regime) if they hold neither U.S. citizenship nor permanent residence, and it also reaches firms and governments of those places. What triggers it is the pairing of that domicile with the lack of U.S. citizenship or permanent residence. For those buyers, the no-purchase zone around a military site or critical infrastructure (an airport, a seaport) extends out to 10 miles. A person may buy one home under a narrow exception with strict conditions. China is stricter: for people domiciled there, for its firms and for its government, the limit reaches nearly all Florida property, wherever it sits, with the same narrow one-home exception for a person. Financing, taxes and how title is held depend on your circumstances, so before you sign, get a Florida attorney and a tax adviser to look at them.

The steps covered on this page are project selection, contract, deposits, construction updates and the walk-through with keys. None of them involves a visa or green card for the United States. A pre-construction purchase is a home purchase, and this page treats it as one.

Your question about how the broker is paid on a new development belongs in the consultation, the same conversation where the project, the contract and the deposits get covered.