Mount Sinai Officials May Decide To Keep Miami Heart Institute

By April M. Havens
After announcing plans to sell the 700,000-square-foot Miami Heart Institute complex to help pay for hospital expansions, Mount Sinai Medical Center officials now say they may instead retain the complex for rehabilitation and other health services.

"We’re always looking at all of the options, including selling the property or just maintaining it and continuing to operate it as a rehab center," President and CEO Steven Sonenreich said.

The four-building complex houses rehabilitation services, but Mount Sinai intends to move all functions to the hospital’s main campus at 4300 Alton Rd. within a year, he said.

Official marketing of the property is to begin in about two weeks, Mr. Sonenreich said. Mount Sinai bought the complex in the late 1990s for $184 million. Mr. Sonenreich said he would "rather not speculate" on the property’s value.

Proceeds from sale of the complex would go toward a new $150 million surgical tower with 14 state-of-the-art operating rooms and 240 private rooms, Mr. Sonenreich said. The tower would rise on the main campus.

Mr. Sonenreich said that while building the surgical tower is not contingent on sale of the Heart Institute complex, it is a significant factor in the impending development. Mount Sinai officials are in the early planning stages of the tower, he said, and cannot offer a timeline for completion.

The land housing the Heart Institute is zoned for full hospital or accessory health-care use, Mr. Sonenreich said. He said some commercial Realtors have said the property would be more marketable as office space or if the building were demolished and replaced with condos. Mr. Sonenreich said zoning changes would be addressed after a buyer expresses interest in the property.

While Mount Sinai officials once preferred a buyer not in the health-care field, Mr. Sonenreich said, they now have softened that stance. Advertisement