Original Finance

After 32 Years in Brickell, Commodities Trader Sucden Moves Its Latin America HQ to Coral Gables

Paris-based Sucden is bringing about 50 employees from 701 Brickell to a 7,649-square-foot office at 255 Alhambra. Brokers say more than 620,000 square feet of tenants have made the same move.

By Entrepreneurs Of Miami Staff · November 12, 2026 at 8:58 AM ET · Updated November 12, 2026 at 8:58 AM ET

Editorial illustration of a sunlit Coral Gables office with arched windows overlooking Mediterranean-style rooftops and royal palms, a wooden desk holding burlap sacks of sugar, coffee beans, cocoa pods, a world map and a brass scale, and moving boxes by the door.

CORAL GABLES — Sucden, one of the world’s big soft commodities traders, has been a Brickell tenant since 1994. Now it’s leaving for Coral Gables.

The Paris-based company signed a 10-year, 7,649-square-foot lease to move its Latin American headquarters to Suite 1000 at 255 Alhambra, a 13-story Class A office building in downtown Coral Gables, CRE-sources reported, citing brokerage Colliers. About 50 employees will move from 701 Brickell Ave., with room to grow.

The deal is small by square footage. What makes it notable is the trend behind it: companies leaving Miami’s main business district for the Gables as Brickell rents and congestion climb.

Who Sucden is

Sucden sources, processes and delivers agricultural products worldwide, including sugar, cocoa, coffee, ethanol, grains and oilseeds. The company started as a sugar broker and has offices around the world, including London and Hong Kong. Its Miami-based arm, Sucden Americas, trades sugar throughout the Americas and manages a network of subsidiaries in key producing and consuming markets.

The new space is a modest step up. We Are Miami, citing The Real Deal, reported that Sucden is going from about 6,400 square feet in Brickell to roughly 7,700 in Coral Gables, and expects to finish the move by next summer.

The deal team

Colliers Senior Vice President Kevin Gonzalez and Vice Chair Stephen Rutchik represented the landlord, a partnership of Terranova Corporation, Torose Equities and LNDMRK Development. That group paid $54.4 million for 255 Alhambra in 2023, according to We Are Miami. Tony Jones, executive vice chair at Cushman & Wakefield, represented Sucden.

The building also kept a local tenant. Accounting and consulting firm Perez-Abreu, Aguerrebere, Sueiro & Torres (PAAST), founded in 1999, completed a 12,244-square-foot renewal and expansion of its headquarters there in August. Fairchild Partners’ Tony Puente represented PAAST.

Together, the two deals total 19,893 square feet.

The Brickell-to-Gables migration, by the numbers

Colliers framed the Sucden move as part of a broader shift.

“These deals are a prime example of the larger corporate migration to Coral Gables, which is increasingly seen as a dynamic alternative to Brickell,” Gonzalez said in remarks published by CRE-sources. He said the nearly 20,000 square feet leased at 255 Alhambra in two months carried a total transaction value of more than $15 million.

“We’ve tracked more than 620,000 square feet of tenants who have moved from Miami’s CBD to Coral Gables, and the trend continues to accelerate with few quality options left in the market,” Gonzalez added. “The result has been a 25% increase in rents in the last 12 months.”

Market data in the same report shows why the Gables is getting attention:

Vacancy: Coral Gables office vacancy fell to 10.1% in the third quarter of 2026, from 11.8% a year earlier, on nearly 100,000 square feet of positive absorption.
Asking rents: Overall asking rents rose 5.9% year over year to $68.74 per square foot, full service gross. Prime Class A space reached $76.17.
The Brickell gap: We Are Miami put Brickell’s average asking rate at $88.28 per square foot, nearly $20 more than the Gables average.

Little new office space has been built in Coral Gables in recent years, which gives landlords pricing power. Owners are spending on renovations and rebranding to push rents higher, CRE-sources reported.

Brickell is still signing tenants

This isn’t a one-way exodus. The same week, biopharma company MoonLake Immunotherapeutics leased about 13,500 square feet at Brickell Key Centre II for a U.S. headquarters that will hold roughly 75 staff, according to We Are Miami. Galderma leased about 19,000 square feet at 801 Brickell Ave. for its U.S. headquarters last year.

The pattern looks less like companies leaving Brickell and more like the market sorting itself out. Firms that want a Brickell address and can pay for it are staying. Cost-conscious tenants that need more room, especially those with long histories in Miami, are taking a hard look at the Gables.

What it means for Miami business owners

For finance, trading and professional-services firms with leases coming up, a few takeaways:

Run the numbers on both markets. A gap of nearly $20 per square foot adds up quickly over a 10-year term.
Don’t wait too long. Gonzalez’s warning about “few quality options left” and a reported 25% jump in rents suggest Coral Gables’ discount is shrinking.
Think about employees. Brickell congestion was one of the factors cited in the shift. Walkable dining and services near the office are now part of how landlords compete for tenants.

Sucden’s move is expected to wrap up by next summer, so Brickell’s longtime sugar trader will be pricing deals out of the Gables by the middle of 2027.