Grace Vernon has had her flower shop, Flowers by Grace, in the Cloverleaf Plaza in Miami Gardens for 30 years. But for the first time since the red and gray plaza was built in 1955, the property is Black owned and managed. “It gives you a sense of pride and just overall feeling so good to know that we’ve come this far, as far as I’m concerned, where you can see someone who looks like you, doing good things and great things,” said Vernon, 74. The new owner of Cloverleaf Plaza is rapper Flo Rida, who purchased the property two years ago with his business partner with the hopes of transforming it into an entrepreneurial hub for Black residents in Miami Gardens.
“We just thought that this would be a great staple,” the rapper, born Tramar Lacel Dillard, told the Miami Herald. “After purchasing the club, Studio 183 we looked at making an investment, buying the entire plaza.” Dillard, who grew up in the Carol City area (now Miami Gardens) before he rose to fame with his hit “Low” featuring T-Pain in 2007, always had an eye for business and the plaza is just one of many investments he’s made since making it big as an artist. In 2023, he purchased Studio 183, an upscale lounge near the Cloverleaf Plaza. Dillard was also a brand ambassador for energy drink maker Celsius for several years and won a landmark lawsuit against the brand for breach of contract. He was awarded $82.6 million. Now it seems like he’s looking for ways to invest that money back in his hometown.
The Cloverleaf Plaza sits at the corner of 183rd Street and Northwest Second Avenue, also known as Highway 441, a busy corridor with several shopping plazas, including Miami Gardens Square and the Lincoln Square Office Building. Through his business, Strong Arm Management, Inc., Dillard and his partner Lee “Freezy” Prince purchased the development in 2023 for $10 million. As Black owners of a commercial plaza, Dillard and his partner are in very small company. A study by Brookings, a research think tank, says that Black people own just 2 percent of nonresidential commercial real estate. Three percent of Black households own commercial real estate, excluding residential properties, compared to 8% of white households, according to a 2022 analysis by Brookings, according to the Brookings study. The plaza has at least a dozen businesses. Longtime tenants say they have already noted the changes since Dillard and Prince took over. “I see that they’re trying to fix up the plaza and make it a little more presentable for us and for our customers. So that’s a welcomed change,” Vernon said.
Nicole Ward, owner of Prestige Beauty Salon, said she feels well taken care of as a tenant. “It’s 100 percent better than before, it’s well kept. We have security guards,” she said. “Mr. Freezy is constantly in the plaza. So, you feel safe. He’s always around. You can get to him easily with any problem.” Right now, Dillard said the plaza will receive an exterior renovation, including a new paint job and asphalt resurfacing, while businesses remain open. At a groundbreaking ceremony held at Dillard’s Studio 183 down the road from the plaza, the city crowned the development the first Black-owned shopping plaza in its more than 20-year history. Miami Gardens is a predominantly Black city, with 63% of its population identifying as Black, according to the U.S. Census.
Tamika Moses, longtime Realtor and Miami native, said the purchase of the Cloverleaf development is part of a national trend of Black people “buying back the block,” or buying property in historically Black neighborhoods that have been or are being gentrified. Moses pointed to Black developers buying property in historically Black neighborhoods such as Overtown in Miami or Sistrunk in Fort Lauderdale that are experiencing gentrification as part of a growing trend in South Florida and nationwide. In Miami Gardens, Rev. T.D. Jakes and Black developers New Urban Development have an affordable housing development planned. In Fort Lauderdale’s Sistrunk community, entrepreneur and distiller Victor Harvey is creating the Victory Entertainment Complex in part as a tribute to the long-gone 1940s-era Victory Theatre and will include a restaurant run by his son, a distillery and a cigar lounge.
“It’s more investor groups that are getting together to actually buy back into the old, historically Black areas…because they want a piece of it and for us to still have our footprint in those areas,” Moses said, adding that Black people have more resources at their disposal to purchase commercial properties through local community redevelopment agencies. She also noted that the Miami Foundation once offered a forgivable loan program to purchase commercial properties, providing a pipeline for Black people to buy such developments. “It’s hard because there’s always been barriers,” Moses said of the challenges Black people have when trying to buy commercial developments. “We were never taught. A lot of us are first generation. So, we’re learning as we go.”
Moses also noted that Danny Felton, owner of co-working space Oasis at Miami Gardens, was one of the first commercial real estate owners in Miami Gardens paving the way for real estate ownership among Black people in the city, and emphasized Dillard and Prince are building on top of that. Moses said buying commercial real estate is a way to establish wealth in Black communities beyond buying a home that builds equity and can be passed on to children or other relatives. “Ownership is the key. You can leverage that equity to go off and go purchase other commercial real estate,” she said. Moses noted owning commercial real estate also helps control the market. She used Felton bringing his business to Miami Gardens as an example because it started attracting more Black businesses to the corridor. Moses also noted when Black people own commercial real estate, they can attract the type of desired business that caters to Black communities.
Dillard admits that owning a plaza was not something he even dared to dream as a kid. “You might own a house and things like that, but growing up just looking at highrises and things like that, the first thing is not to think that you can own it,” Dillard said. “Maybe you have a spot there, but you won’t really own it. So to actually own our own plaza is just phenomenal.”
