Shaya Boymelgreen and Africa-Israel Investments will start with a 55-story high-rise condominium and boutique hotel on the site of the former Howard Johnson hotel at Biscayne Boulevard and 11th Street. Future projects include redevelopment of the Miami Arena site.

Those plans are just the beginning of the South Florida dreams of A.I. & Boymelgreen. The partnership announced at a news conference Monday that it spent $130 million to acquire 25 parcels stretching from the Park West area of downtown Miami to the Performing Arts Center, Biscayne Boulevard in Edgewater, the Brickell Avenue area and South Beach.

The long-term plan calls for construction of 3.5 million square feet, more than three Wachovia Financial Centers. Most of the projects will be residential or mixed-use.

''We're very committed to the people and the city of Miami,'' said Pinchas Cohen, chief executive of Africa-Israel Investments, a publicly traded investment conglomerate based in Tel Aviv.

The largest chunk of the land -- 14 properties -- was owned by UBS Warburg, an investment banking and securities firm with headquarters in Connecticut, and parking lot magnate Hank Sopher.

Sopher began buying up vacant land downtown during the late 1990s before real estate began to boom and prices soared. He will remain involved with the projects as a minority investor.

But Sopher is not done buying. He says he's already working on another 15 acquisitions stretching from downtown to North Miami-Dade and Broward counties, including the former Parkway Hospital site. He expects his new partners to be involved in many of the deals.

''We're going on to bigger and better things,'' said Sopher, during a phone interview from New York City. ``We see the whole South Florida area as a new real estate market.''

Boymelgreen and Africa-Israel bring the development experience to carry out what Sopher started. The partnership is already developing more than five million square feet in New York and Canada, including residential and mixed-use projects with retail shopping.

The genesis of Boymelgreen's move to South Florida lies in a Hanukkah menorah lighting celebration last December at Miami City Hall. Boymelgreen came to the ceremony with his brother-in-law, local rabbi Yakov Fellig, who introduced him to Miami Mayor Manny Diaz. The connection quickly came together.

Diaz declined to credit his conversation with luring the billion-dollar development plans to Miami but did say it may have played a role.

''We're hoping for a very long-lasting relationship between the city and this group,'' Diaz said.

A.I. & Boymelgreen would not provide many details Monday about its development plans for Miami.

The biggest question mark surrounds the Miami Arena site, which is subject to the partnership winning an Aug. 10 auction.

The site would likely include a mixed-use project with a strong high-rise component, said Miami real estate broker Edie Laquer, who will be a minority partner in the arena development.

The partnership's first project, on the Howard Johnson site, will include 334 residential units, plus a 40-unit boutique hotel and street-front retail shops. The triangular-shaped building has been designed by Arquitectonica. Sales are expected to begin early next year for units averaging $750,000. Construction is expected to begin in one year with an opening by 2007.

But local real estate analysts are concerned about a potential glut.

Roughly 16,000 new residential units are either announced or underway in the urban corridor stretching from the Brickell neighborhood to the area above the Performing Arts Center, north of downtown, according to the Downtown Development Authority. That's about four times what has been built since 1995.

Boymelgreen isn't worried about any potential condo glut, pointing out that most projects where construction is underway are already sold.

''Developers are risky people,'' he said. ``It's a calculated risk.''

Herald staff writer Michael Vasquez contributed to this report.