Proprietor of $6.5M Miami Seaside ‘celebration home’ reaches take care of metropolis over lawsuit – NBC 6 South Florida

The owner of a luxury Miami Beach home south of the city over being a “party house” has reached an agreement with the city, court records showed.

The home, located at 1776 Bay Drive, had been described as an “illegal short-term rental” that had accumulated hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid fines and code violations.

The suit said the home’s guests had caused “frequent and reoccurring disturbances to neighbors.”

Under the agreement reached Friday, the home’s owner and operator, Stephen Kraus and The Nightfall Group LLC, have agreed to not use the house as a short-term rental.

Miami Beach defines short-term rentals as anything fewer than six months and a day.

Under the agreement, any rental listings for the property for any term less than six months must be removed.

In exchange, the city will reduce the fines against the home – which topped $290,000, according to the lawsuit – down to $250, and will drop the suit.

The suit said Kraus had purchased the home in 2020 for $6.5 million, and the home was making as much as $7,650 per night.

According to the suit, the landlord and/or tenant had been cited with at least 45 violations of the city code since February 2022, including repeated noise violations and improper commercial use of the property and more.