BOCA RATON, FL (Boca Post) (Copyright © 2026) — A long-standing hotel property off Yamato Road in Boca Raton is headed toward a major reuse project after the city’s planning and zoning board approved a proposal to convert the site into 125 apartments, retail space, and a restaurant tied into the nearby El Rio Trail.
The unanimous 7-0 vote came Thursday night on an application brought by Boca HI Suites, owner of the Holiday Inn property at 701 NW 53rd Street. The plan would keep the existing building in place rather than demolishing it, while reworking the interior from hotel rooms into residential units and adding new pedestrian-focused improvements around the site.
The project would turn the current 183-room hotel into a multifamily development with 125 apartments across 83,697 square feet. Plans also include an attached restaurant with outdoor dining and three retail units totaling 4,501 square feet.
The site sits near Yamato Road and the El Rio Canal corridor, an area city officials and applicants are increasingly viewing through the lens of trail access, pedestrian use, and future transit connections.
David Milledge, an attorney representing the property owner, told board members the building itself would remain intact. He said the structure, which has five wings but functions as one continuous building, would receive exterior aesthetic improvements while the interior is renovated for residential use.
A central piece of the proposal is a planned connection to the El Rio Trail.
Milledge said the owner will provide an 8-foot shared-use path around the property, linking the site to the trail at both the north and south ends. He said the path is intended to activate the canal corridor and create a more usable public-facing edge with space for residents and trail users to stop for coffee, meals, or other daily activity.
The application also includes a new crosswalk on NW 53rd Street, a new bus shelter at the main entrance on NW 7th Avenue, bicycle parking, a pedestrian sidewalk, enhanced ADA-accessible landscaping, and covered outdoor dining space tied to the restaurant component.
The restaurant tenant has not yet been selected. The owner told the board the space is expected to be leased to a private operator who would run both the restaurant and a bar with outdoor seating near the trail connection.
Inside the building, the conversion would create a mix of efficiency, one-bedroom, and two-bedroom units by combining the hotel’s existing room layout into larger apartments. Under the plan, one hotel room would become an efficiency unit of about 400 square feet, two rooms would be combined into a one-bedroom unit of about 800 square feet, and three rooms would be joined to form a two-bedroom unit of about 1,200 square feet.
The housing mix also includes an affordability component. Ten percent of the units are designated as affordable housing, while 5 percent are designated as workforce housing.
Board members asked about expected rent levels, but the applicant said final pricing has not been set and will be determined after all approvals are secured and after consultation with a broker.
Milledge told the board the age of the building, which dates to the 1980s, is expected to place it below the top end of the rental market when compared with newly built apartment projects. He said there is an expectation that rents will be more attainable than those in newer developments. The owner estimated rents could begin around $1,500 per month.
The retail portion of the project will face NW 8th Avenue and is designed with exterior pedestrian access, further shifting the property away from its hotel layout and toward a mixed-use residential site.
Thursday’s vote does not finalize the redevelopment. The planning and zoning board’s approval sends the application to the Boca Raton City Council, which will have the final say on whether the hotel conversion can move forward.
For residents, the next step is the council review. If approved there, the project would convert an existing commercial lodging property into housing while adding retail, restaurant space, and new public-facing trail and street improvements in the Yamato Road corridor.
Roadway improvements, public works upgrades, and capital investments affect neighborhoods across the city. Read the latest infrastructure and growth coverage in our Boca Raton City Government and Development section.
