UPDATE/BankUnited Plans Class A Stock Offering.

CORAL GABLES, Fla. -- BankUnited Financial Corporation (NASDAQ:BKUNA) announced it expects to offer 5 million shares of its Class A Common Stock in an underwritten public offering beginning on or after January 19, 2006. BankUnited has agreed to grant the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase an additional 750,000 shares of Class A Common Stock at the public offering price, less the underwriting discount, solely to cover over-allotments.

BankUnited intends to use the proceeds from the offering for general corporate purposes. This may include the continued expansion of the company's operations through new branch offices and operations centers, possible acquisitions, acquisition of debt and equity securities if available on favorable terms, redemption of outstanding debt, and investment in loans and mortgage-backed or other securities.

BankUnited's offering is being underwritten by joint book-runners and lead managers Bear, Stearns & Co. Inc. and Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Inc. and co-managers J. P. Morgan Securities Inc. and UBS Securities LLC.

About BankUnited

BankUnited Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:BKUNA) is the holding company for BankUnited FSB, the largest banking institution headquartered in Florida as measured by assets. BankUnited had assets of $11.3 billion at Dec. 31, 2005. Serving customers in nine Florida counties through 66 branches, BankUnited offers a full spectrum of consumer and commercial banking products and services, including online products that can be accessed through http://www.bankunited.com. For additional information, call [phone].

Forward-Looking Statements 

This press release may contain certain forward-looking statements, which are based on management's expectations regarding factors that may impact the company's earnings and performance in future periods. Words and phrases such as: "will likely result," "expect," "will continue," "anticipate," "estimate," "project," "believe," "intend," "should," "may," "can," "could," "plan," "target" and similar expressions are intended to identify "forward-looking statements." Actual results or performance would differ from those implied or contemplated by such statements. Factors that could cause future results and performance to vary materially from current management expectations include, but are not limited to, general business and economic conditions; fiscal and monetary policies; significant weather events such as hurricanes; war and terrorism; changes in interest rates; deposit flows; loan demand and real estate values; competition with other providers of financial products and services; the issuance or redemption of additional company equity or debt; volatility in the market price of our common stock; changes in accounting principles, policies or guidelines; changes in laws or regulation; reliance on other companies for products and services; and other economic, competitive, servicing capacity, governmental, regulatory and technological factors affecting the company's operations, pricing, products and delivery of services.

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy, nor will there be any sale of these securities in any state in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state, and is issued pursuant to Rule 134 under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.

A copy of the preliminary prospectus supplement may be obtained by contacting either of the persons listed below.