Condo Hotels' Enduring Legacy: Hotel-Enhanced Mixed-Use
By Jim Butler, Hotel Lawyer | Author of www.HotelLawBlog.com
7 September 2006
I've been reading some press items lately that suggest the condo hotel phenomenon is coming to an end. The stories point to a few specific markets, like South Florida and Las Vegas, that are saturated with capital and deals, or to specific projects that have gone awry.
Are condo hotels dead? No, they are alive and well. Will the super-heated boom continue? No. Consumer demand will normalize and be cyclical, but quality projects will continue to be successful, particularly in markets that have not been flooded with product.
In any event, we believe that condo hotels continue to perform a valuable role and have earned an enduring legacy in the hospitality industry. They make new hotel development feasible where limited financing and skyrocketing constructions costs would otherwise be prohibitive. And perhaps more importantly--at least over the long-term--condo hotels have changed the way we view hotels being mixed with residential other kinds of real estate projects.
From direct experience with more than 80 hotel mixed-use projects over the past five years, all of which involved a condo hotel or residential component, often with other commercial real estate uses as well, we have participated in a intense effort that has produced some break-through solutions to obstacles that held back many earlier mixed-use projects. This effort has created a new technology and a deep pool of practical experience that already paying huge dividends. This technology and experience is critical to the success of hotel mixed-use as it takes an ever more-prominent role in commercial real estate.
And these improved approaches and body of experience for hotel mixed-use were developed just in time to join the now widely-hailed and more universal explosion of real estate mixed-use projects. In the last decade, the real estate industry has come full circle from viewing mixed-use with suspicion and derision. It is now seen as a legitimate class of real estate in its own right, and one that has captured the imagination of everyone. Increasingly, hotels are gaining recognition as the "ultimate amenity" for mixed-use projects because they can distinguish the project, provide a great driver of traffic, and offer an integrating center or hub for the mixed-use villages.
We like to call the next generation of well-conceived and executed projects "hotel-enhanced mixed-use." But that is a subject for another blog entry. Stay tuned!
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Our Perspective. We represent developers, owners and lenders. We have helped our clients as business and legal advisors on more than $50 billion of hotel transactions, involving more than 1,000 properties all over the world. For more information, please contact Jim Butler at jbutler@jmbm.com or 310.201.3526.
Jim Butler is one of the top hotel lawyers in the world. GOOGLE "hotel lawyer" or "hotel mixed-use" or "condo hotel lawyer" and you will see why.
Jim devotes 100% of his practice to hospitality, representing hotel owners, developers and lenders. Jim leads JMBM's Global Hospitality Group® - a team of 50 seasoned professionals with more than $50 billion of hotel transactional experience, involving more than 1,000 properties located around the globe.
Jim and his team are more than "just" great hotel lawyers. They are also hospitality consultants and business advisors. They are deal makers. They can help find the right operator or capital provider. They know who to call and how to reach them. They are a major gateway of hotel finance, facilitating the flow of capital with their legal skill, hospitality industry knowledge and ability to find the right "fit" for all parts of the capital stack. Because they are part of the very fabric of the hotel industry, they are able to help clients identify key business goals, assemble the right team, strategize the approach to optimize value and then get the deal done.
Jim is frequently quoted as an expert on hotel issues by national and industry publications such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Forbes, BusinessWeek, and Hotel Business. A frequent author and speaker, Jim's books, articles and many expert panel presentations cover topics reflecting his practice, including hotel and hotel-mixed use investment and development, negotiating, re-negotiating or terminating hotel management agreements, acquisition and sale of hospitality properties, hotel finance, complex joint venture and entity structure matters, workouts, as well as many operating and strategic issues.
Jim Butler is a Founding Partner of Jeffer, Mangels, Butler & Marmaro LLP and he is Chairman of the firm's Global Hospitality Group®. If you would like to discuss any hospitality or condo hotel matters, Jim would like to hear from you. Contact him at jbutler@jmbm.com or 310.201.3526. For his views on current industry issues, visit www.HotelLawBlog.com.
