The ‘$1bn marina’ hoping to address an ‘acute crisis’

opinion

by Rob Hodgetts

19 July 2024

Habacoa is a planned superyacht marina in South Abaco, Bahamas. (Photo: Design by Zaha Hadid Architects, rendering by Flyingarchitecture)

He describes it as a “billion-dollar plus” project but Ra’anan Ben-Zur insists the “overwhelming” demand for his planned Habacoa superyacht marina in the Bahamas will answer an “acute crisis”.

The real estate and hotel developer says his scheme will be the “largest superyacht marina in the entire North American basin” and will offer the first “really iconic resort” in the Caribbean.

Ben-Zur originally envisioned a hotel and residences but “divine intervention” led him to the concept of a marina. With little experience, he began studying the business.

“I understood very quickly that the real issue is that there is simply very little space for superyachts in marinas,” he says.

‘Very profitable’

According to Ben-Zur, the average age of marinas in the US is 45 years old, with infrastructure to match. “It is because there is no oceanfront land anymore, and even if there is, the regulatory approvals are really difficult,” he says.

“So, bottom line, superyachts are mostly anchored outside marinas. They don’t have space.” He points to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ 127m yacht Koru which recently had to moor between oil tankers at Port Everglades.

The development on South Abaco will comprise 150 berths, mostly for yachts above 24m with the largest berth able to accommodate a vessel of 230m. The marina will also feature a deep entry canal and turning circle of 268m. Work is set to begin next April, with completion planned for 2027.

“This is a billion-dollar plus project, but I can tell you that it looks to be a very profitable project too, otherwise we could not have put it together,” says Ben-Zur, who was born in Israel but lived first in the UK and then in the US for more than 30 years.

“I have already got tens of millions of dollars into it and of course we have other investors coming in.” One of those is US entrepreneur Rocco DiLillo, who is chairman of the development.

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Skyrocketing

Ben-Zur has been plotting Habacoa for seven years and acquired the land on the southern tip of South Abaco in August 2023 through his Habacoa-SWP-Development company. Since starting a whisper campaign in recent months, he says the reception has been “overwhelming”.

The 500-acre site will be “low density” with more than 300 luxury residential units at three price levels, including a planned branded hotel and residences, a yacht club, a night club and casino designed by Zaha Hadid Architects as well as other marina functions.

Forty of the residences will come with yacht berths for vessels up to 70m, which potentially brings another return on investment for purchasers renting out berths.

Ben-Zur wouldn’t be drawn on numbers but in general he said that demand for real estate in South Florida is “very high” and prices are “skyrocketing”. He sees the Bahamas largely as an “extension” to this, pointing to the inflated prices at the resort of Albany on nearby New Providence island.

“I will tell you this, the big money is in the real estate,” he says. “The marina is the anchor.”

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The proposed Habacoa Yacht Club has been penned by Zaha Hadid Architects. (Photo: Design by Zaha Hadid Architects, rendering by Flyingarchitecture.)

Big business

The projections for the marina are based on three market segments: superyachts, normal yachts and sports fishing boats, given Habacoa’s quick access to the famed Abaco Marls flat-fishing area and the Great Bahama Canyon deep-sea fishing destination.

“The estimate is that there are 20,000 yachts leaving the east coast of Florida every year to fish in the Bahamas so that is a big business,” he says.

“I don’t want to share complete numbers, but we believe that our numbers are very conservative. And as I said, the returns are very high, even with these conservative numbers.”

Another attraction will be the nearby airfield at Sandy Point, which is being redeveloped with a runway of 6,500-7,000ft catering for most private jets, depending on conditions. Habacoa is a 30-minute flight from Miami or two hours from New York. “It’s well within a weekend cruise, and you are back in your office in Wall Street on Monday morning, trying to make money,” adds Ben-Zur.

Opposition

Habacoa says it will have a $2bn impact on the local economy in its first 10 years and offer plentiful opportunities for locals, who are “all in favour of this project, in writing, in voice, in everything”, according to Ben-Zur, who added a $7m fund has been set aside to help locals become business owners. Once operational, developers pledge that the workforce will be 80% Bahamian.

Given its pristine location, and sited near the Abaco National Park, Habacoa and its team of environmental advisors has been in dialogue with concerned environmental groups “for many years”.

An early environmental impact assessment received “significant” opposition from 14 groups, but Ben-Zur said his team had a “willingness” to work together to “mend the relationships”.

Olivia Patterson-Maura, executive director of Bahamian organisation Friends of the Environment grouped together with a number of local bodies to form Sustainable South Abaco which lobbied the developer and the government.

“We are not opposed to sustainable development in South Abaco, but the Tysroz project [the name of Ben-Zur’s family company] will lead to irreparable damage to the ecology and history of South Abaco while risking the livelihood of generations of Bahamians that rely on these resources,” it said in a petition to Prime Minister Hubert A. Minnis.

Changes to the plans followed before Habacoa received clearance from the Bahamas’ Department of Environmental Planning and Protection (DEPP).

“Since then, there has been very little opposition,” says Ben-Zur. “We have all the environmental approvals, so we are shovel-ready from that point of view.”

Patterson Maura tells Superyacht Investor she has not seen the latest environmental impact assessment so is unable to comment on the current plans. “However, if the location and scale of the project remain the same then many of our concerns are still relevant,” she says.

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Discounts

In terms of sustainability, Habacoa has committed to using 30% solar energy for its power and will store rainwater to supply all of its potable water needs. A fund of $10m will focus on sustainability projects such as coral preservation and environmental mitigation schemes.

What is not yet clear is whether Habacoa will exclude more polluting yachts or follow the lead of Monaco’s SEA Index and offer discounts to greener yachts.

“We have not yet reached a definitive decision about whether or not we going to offer a discount or whether we do other initiatives, but we are definitely going to try and be a very sustainable green marina,” says Ben-Zur