South Beach

South Beach is the southern two miles of Miami Beach, from Dade Boulevard at 23rd Street down to South Pointe Park and the ship channel. It is the part of Miami the world pictures: the Art Deco hotels along Ocean Drive, Lincoln Road's pedestrian mall, Española Way, and a beach that runs the full length of the district with the boardwalk behind it. Alton Road and West Avenue on the bay side carry the everyday life — groceries, the marina, the causeways to the mainland.

The condo stock divides cleanly. South of Fifth Street is the island's most expensive ground: Continuum, Apogee, Portofino Tower, Murano Grande and the Yacht Club at Portofino on the point, with South Pointe Park and Joe's Stone Crab at their feet. Along Collins and Ocean Drive the buildings are smaller and older — restored Deco and MiMo buildings, the Setai and W residences among them — and on the bay side the Venetian Islands, Belle Isle and the Sunset Harbour buildings offer water views at lower prices per square foot than the ocean.

South Beach has the deepest condo market in Miami Beach, so its building pages carry the longest sales histories; they also show the widest gap between a renovated unit in a 1980s tower and a new South of Fifth residence a few blocks away.