While other companies foundered in the face of the financial crisis, Fort Lauderdale's BTI Partners LLC managed to grow.

The real estate company developed a novel strategy to acquire distressed assets during the downturn that led to over $1.5 billion in transactions.

Managing principal Noah Breakstone helped BTI gain title to thousands of acres of land in the last six years, most of which is now being transformed into residential communities. He did so by purchasing defaulted bonds tied to community development districts, special taxing districts created by developers to fund infrastructure costs for large, master-planned projects. There were over 400 districts formed in Florida from 2003 to 2008 with over $6 billion worth of bonds issued to finance their infrastructure, according to a report by Miami Lakes advisory firm Income Securities Advisor. When the housing market collapsed, a large chunk of the districts defaulted on their bonds and, in most cases, the developers who backed them also fell into financial distress.