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Linda McNamee thought she could relax once she and her husband finished moving into their new assisted living home at Oasis Living Quarters in February. They’d had their doubts after talking to a few of the residents, but were enticed by the pretty grounds and the persuading of its management team over lunch.
“They wined and dined me,” the 80-year-old recalled. “They said this’ll be done, this’ll be done. Needless to say, we moved in.”
A month later, the Fort Lauderdale assisted living home is evicting all of its residents, including McNamee, in order to convert the property into luxury apartments, according to residents, their family members and a new lawsuit. Operators have given no written notice, a violation of Florida law.
The Florida Agency for Healthcare Administration is investigating, a spokesperson said in an email late Friday afternoon, and “may impose fines and pursue legal action for noncompliance with regulatory requirements and state law.”
The same management team that had invited McNamee to stay there held a “mandatory” meeting in early March to inform residents and their family members that they would have to move out immediately while it conducts “renovations,” according to several residents and family members who attended. But when questioned about when and how they could move back in, Steven Gottlieb, the administrator, told them that when they did move back, everything that made it an assisted living site would no longer exist, they said.
Over the last few weeks, families have frantically arrived, some from out of state, to move their loved ones out and find somewhere that will take them on short notice. Some have dementia, others are bedridden or in need of round-the-clock medical care. Weeks later, none of the residents or family members have received anything in writing.
The conversion is part of a growing real estate trend with origins in New York, according to Michael Brevda, an attorney at the Senior Justice law firm based in Boca Raton, specifically in areas where housing is in high demand.
“This is something that we’re seeing that really came from the NYC metro area and we’re seeing it occur more and more in some of the hotter real estate markets in Florida,” Brevda said. “These facility owners are realizing that their property is more valuable as a condominium or apartment and are deciding to make a decision, based on their profit margin, to close out the facility, which is shameful because it leaves the residents in a really tough bind.”
In the area where Oasis is located, property owners are allowed to convert assisted living facilities into apartment buildings without any special reviews under Fort Lauderdale zoning requirements, according to city officials.
But the state law requires written notice well in advance; Brevda added that he had never seen a situation where the home did not provide written notice to its residents.
A forced relocation
Florida law dictates that, should an assisted living facility close, it “shall inform, in writing, the agency and each resident or the next of kin, legal representative, or agency acting on each resident’s behalf” with 30 days’ notice or face a $5,000 fine. Another law states that any assisted living facility must provide 45 days’ written notice prior to “relocation or termination of residency from the facility.”
But several residents who spoke to the Sun Sentinel said even before the March eviction they had been moved, sometimes up to four times within the last year, as Oasis began converting its buildings into apartments, often with less than a week’s notice.
William Tabor, 73, and his wife, Annette, say they have lived in four different apartments in the past year, their last move from the fourth floor to the third floor. They were told that they could move back once the company was done “remodeling,” Tabor recalled. That didn’t happen.
The first major relocation took place in May 2024, when Oasis moved about half of its residents, including Tabor, from the independent living building into the assisted living building, telling them it was for renovations, according to multiple residents and family members. That half of the building is now Waterview Rental luxury apartments.
Lillian Alfano said her 74-year-old mother-in-law once resided in the independent living building. Then, in May, management told her she would have to move into an apartment in assisted living in a matter of days. A week after her move, she had a stroke.
Daniel Feliciano said his mother was given a week to move just before Mother’s Day. When he got there, he saw people in the halls, pushing their own boxes.
“You know what really upset me,” he said, “is the fact that the elderly have no one helping them. Some of these people have nobody. Nobody.”
The Tabors’ closest relatives live in Idaho, and have been helping them over the phone.
After the first major relocation, in January, management suddenly moved residents with dementia out of the memory care building, also telling them it was for renovations, family members said. Some family members said their loved ones were left without belongings, hot water, or food they could eat.
In January, John Defelice said his mother was moved, without his knowledge, from the secured building for dementia patients into an unsecured, unfurnished apartment with only a bed. Her belongings, including a flat-screen TV, were still in her old room when they began to remodel the old building.
“They called me and I said, ‘Are you telling me that you’re going to move her out of her apartment or that you moved her out of her apartment?'” he recalled. “‘Well, we did it today.’ I said, ‘Well, it sounds like past tense to me.'”
Defelice said that, a week after her move, his mother came down with pneumonia, and she has been in the hospital ever since. Meanwhile, they moved her out of her apartment. He’s now trying to recover $12,000 in rent that he was charged for January and February.
“It was upsetting to my mother,” he said. “A lot of them are disoriented to begin with. They have no idea what’s going on. And all of a sudden they’re dumped out of the building.”
Defelice’s mother joined multiple residents relocated from memory care with no notice, according to residents and family. Both of Corinne Saada’s parents have dementia and were staying in the secured facility when, like Defelice’s mother, staff members said they had to move them in January, she told the South Florida Sun Sentinel. They were placed in the assisted living building, where, for three weeks, she said they had no hot water.
“It was just a disaster,” Saada said.
Both of Saada’s parents became confused, their memories deteriorating further, a common occurrence for dementia patients removed from their environment or routine.
“They get worse,” she said. “The level of confusion is off the charts. They don’t understand why they’re there.”
The situation became even more dire for Saada over the last few weeks when the kitchen began serving her father food he couldn’t eat due to his insulin dependence, but he couldn’t remember that he couldn’t eat it.
Saada began searching for a new place for her parents, but many didn’t want to take them. Finally, she managed to find one that did, and her parents moved in last week.
Sometime in late February or early March, residents found notices on their doors about a mandatory meeting on March 5, just after all of the residents paid rent, leaving them and their family members out of thousands of dollars at the same time as they would need to pay to move and put down a deposit on a new place.
As the reality dawned on residents and their families, the meeting descended into chaos, attendees said.
“It was horrible,” McNamee said. “People were crying, people were screaming.”
In conversations following the meeting, management told residents and their families that they had until early April to move out, according to a lawsuit filed last week and several family members.
“It’s heartless, for lack of a better word,” said David Comras, whose 88-year-old aunt, Rema, is bedridden and requires 24/7 care. Comras, an attorney, filed a lawsuit on his aunt’s behalf. “And it’s contrary to Florida law. All to make a buck.”
Rema Comras, 88, is bedridden, according to her daughter, Diane Kenney, who found out about the eviction only because one of Comras’ nurses attended the meeting.
Comras’ lawsuit seeks an injunction against Oasis, stating that it violated Florida law by kicking out residents in order to convert to luxury apartments with no written notice and less than 45 days to vacate.
Several residents say they have not received their March rent or deposits back. William Tabor said he and his wife can’t afford all of the moves, which they have had to pay for themselves.
“I’m going to be down to my last couple hundred until my Social Security comes in,” he said Friday.
At lunch on Friday, the Tabors sat across from the McNamees in the desolate cafeteria. At a nearby table, three women who had become close friends prepared to separate in the coming days. Dining staff handed out their meal: a slice of pizza cut into halves, which William Tabor shouldn’t eat because he’s diabetic, so he spends his own money on Instacart deliveries instead.
Down the hall, a veterans plaque that once included residents was torn down and replaced by a painting of the sea. The rooms and halls are largely empty save for boxes and occasional movers walking in and out. Outside, in the lobby, is a sign for Waterview Rental.
‘There’s nothing they can do to these people’
Oasis Living Quarters was last purchased in October 2022 by an LLC called Lauderdale Commercial Blvd Partners, whose registered agent is Mark Tress, a real estate magnate based in Lakewood, N.J., according to Florida business records.
A South Florida Business Journal article says the LLC, managed by Tress, purchased the property for $39 million, but Tress said in an email that he “no longer manage(s) this property for ownership.” When asked who the current owner is, Tress did not respond.
Tress was named one of the 100 worst landlords in New York City in 2024, the same year he was sued by the city over falling debris at his properties.
An employee on the sales side referred to Gottlieb, the administrator, for comment. Calls and voicemails from the Sun Sentinel left with Gottlieb and Oasis have gone unreturned. A woman at the front desk said that Gottlieb was not there and her boss would be out for an unknown amount of time. A man who would not identify himself or his position said, “as far as what I’ve been told, it’s no comment” when asked for information outside of one of the management offices Friday.
Kenney and other family members also have filed complaints with the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration, which regulates assisted living facilities.
Oasis has been cited several times since changing hands, according to AHCA records.
An AHCA employee told Kenney in an email a little over a week ago that it has “opened a complaint and asked staff in our Delray Beach Field Office to perform an on-site inspection” and “will inform you in writing of the results.”
A spokesperson for the agency told the South Florida Sun Sentinel in an email Wednesday that “The Agency is conducting monitoring visits at Oasis Living Quarters to ensure all residents are safely discharged prior to closure.” On Friday, it said in response to follow-up emails, “The Agency is still conducting its investigation. Once we have completed the investigation, the full report will be posted online.”
Some residents said they had also spoken to their local ombudsman, a state office that advocates for seniors.
“But there’s nothing they can do to these people,” McNamee said of the ombudsman. “They don’t want a home anymore; they don’t want a residence for seniors.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Elder Affairs, which runs the office, did not respond to questions by publication date.
Compared to nursing homes, assisted living facilities abide by fewer rules and regulations, which can leave residents vulnerable. A federal nursing home reform law provides strict rules for discharging residents; no such federal law exists for assisted living homes.
“I think there is an assumption that people who are in assisted living, except for people in memory care units, are still competent, they’re able to advocate for themselves, able to communicate,” said Stephanie Schneider, an elder law attorney based in Plantation. “Whereas there’s probably an assumption when someone’s in a skilled nursing facility that they’re not.”
While legal penalties do exist for assisted living sites that shut down without written notice, family members feel that they are not steep enough to deter the property owners, particularly those no longer planning to operate as an assisted living facility in need of a license. The $5,000 fine for failing to provide 30 days’ written notice of a shutdown is less than the amount that many family members pay each month in rent.
“At end of the day, this place doesn’t care about that, because they’re not going to be reopening as an assisted living,” said Ken Bolis, whose wheelchair-bound, 98-year-old mother resided at Oasis until this week.
Since the meeting, Bolis’ mother has become confused and anxious, he said. He told the Sun Sentinel he would be moving her out the following day, a reality neither of them had anticipated.
“My mom never expected to leave this place,” Bolis said. “She’s 98. She thought she’d live out rest of her life here. Suddenly, in a matter of three weeks, her whole life has changed.”
