Palm Beach’s Booming Economy: 2025 Forecasts Growth in Commercial Real Estate and Business Development

An early peak at the economy of Palm Beach shows that 2025 will be a robust year for the commercial real-estate sector, according to local officials and real-estate experts.

The experts say they see more demand for shops, hotels, restaurants and office space in West Palm Beach. The Business Development Board, the county’s economic development arm, is conducting a major ad campaign to attract more business to the area.

One such ad is aimed at New York. It shows a waterfront view of West Palm Beach, with a message: “Dear NYC, It’s not you. It’s me. Love #Wall Street South/# Palm Beach.”

Palm Beach has been widely described as Wall Street South, with a number of financial firms moving to South Florida. Ads are also aimed at businesses in Chicago and Boston.

Here are some of the major upcoming moves:

Vanderbilt University’s graduate business school is building a 300,000-square-foot campus in West Palm Beach that could begin hosting classes next year. Vanderbilt secured approval from County Commissioners to build the $519.6 million campus. The county will donate five acres of land worth $46 million.

Cleveland Clinic has announced plans to purchase land for a new hospital in West Palm Beach. The plans include 150 inpatient beds, an emergency department, a medical office building and an ambulatory surgery center. Other medical facilities are also expected to announce plans to open in West Palm Beach, real-estate experts said.

Two new restaurants are to open: Milos, in an office building in downtown West Palm, and Kyma, on the ground floor and rooftop of another office building.

North Railroad Avenue is slated to have a bunch of new restaurants opening this year, among them  a coffee shop called Sunday Motor Co.; Loco Taqueria & Oyster Bar; H&H Bagels, Van Leeuwen Ice Cream and Juliana’s Pizza, all New York-based.

Related Ross of West Palm Beach has been attracting financial firms to the area, and told investors at a conference in the fall that it is looking for more ways to bring in more such companies.

Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach will be a beacon for government officials, media types, and tourists during the year and beyond. That will mean business for hotels, restaurants and night-spots.

There are also plans for new physical fitness studios, barbershops, hair salons and clothing stores, and even another shopping center, called Sunday Village, in southern Palm Beach County.

Kenneth Himmel, CEO of Related Ross, told the investors that Vanderbilt’s graduate campus will help bring in venture capitalists and private equity firms.

“This will help us to attract a new generation of industries,” Himmel told the group.

The new moves come on top of word from Cushman & Wakefield that office space is already limited.  County-wide, occupancy is 87.5%, the firm said. In West Palm Beach, it is 89%.

But county officials say this is no time to sit back and rest. They plan on encouraging more building and more companies.

Development has been building for years, according to Dr. Jerry D. Parrish, an economist, in a report for the county’s Business Development Board.

Parrish found that, between 2010 through 2021, the finance and insurance sectors showed the highest growth; that was followed by the transportation and warehousing group, and then a category called “company headquarters.”

The economist also found that Palm Beach County “is the number one agricultural county in the state.”

Professional and business services have also grown substantially in the past few years, Parrish’s report says.

“These are all indicators that the Palm Beach County economy has diversified and added substantial amounts of high-value added, high-wage jobs,” he wrote.