Luxury Hotelier - September 2007 - (Page 12)

12| Inform Openings RockResorts announced The Arrabelle at Vail Square in Vail, Colorado, will debut on January 5. Upon completion, The Arrabelle will offer a hotel experience that combines Old World charm and the timeless elegance of Europe’s grand resorts with the romance and world-class style of Vail’s alpine heritage. The Arrabelle will feature 36 guestrooms and 50 condominiums. Additionally, The Arrabelle will have 67 residences and penthouses and a 10,000-square-foot spa. The Millennium Hotel Doha in Qatar was opened by His Highness Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani in May. The hotel, which has 226 guestrooms, is located in the heart of the commercial and diplomatic district. The Millennium Hotel Doha is the sixth hotel operated by Millennium Hotels in the Middle East. Langham Hotels International announced signing of the management contract for the Langham Place Hotel, Changchun, China. The management contract is signed with Changchun Jinzuo Real Estate Development Company Limited for a new five-star hotel, which is scheduled to open in 2009 in downtown Changchun. LHI also signed a management contract to operate the Langham Place Hotel, Chaoyang, Beijing, reflecting the group’s accelerated expansion plan in China. Trump International Hotel & Tower Chicago will welcome its first hotel guests in December. The hotel, comprising floors 14 through 27 of a 92-story residential tower in development by the Trump Organization, features 339 guestrooms, including one-, two- and three-bedroom suites. The property was designed by the architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill with interiors by McGinley Design. U.S. luxury hotel transactions reach $11.5 billion in first half M ore than $11.5 billion in upscale and luxury lodging facilities in the United States changed hands in the first half of 2007, according to Stephen Hennis, managing director of Denver, Colorado-based Hospitium. Through the second quarter, 177 luxury assets traded hands. “The robust hotel investment landscape shows no immediate signs of tapering,” Mr. Hennis says. “At the current pace, 2007 is expected to reach $20 billion in highend asset transactions, the third straight year with over $17 billion in deal activity.” According to Hospitium, per-room pricing for upscale and luxury lodging assets declined slightly from a record $243,000 in 2006 to $228,000 through the first half of this year, but nevertheless is well above historic levels. “Asset pricing has apparently reached its peak. Property cash flows are continuing to grow; however, market values are being kept in check as cap rates edge upwards,” Mr. Hennis says. The top price-per-room deals in the U.S. during the first half of 2007 include: The Maui [Hawaii] Prince Makena (310 guestrooms, $575 million price tag, $1,854,839 per room); the Casa Malibu [California] Inn on the Beach (21 guestrooms, $20 million price tag, $952,381 per room); Fairmont Sonoma [California] Mission Inn (228 guestrooms, $175 million price tag, $767,544 per room). Food for thought at high-end properties f the 162 million leisure travelers in the United States in 2006, one in six can be identified as a culinary traveler— meaning there’s a market of 27.3 million culinary travelers, according to a study from the Travel Industry Association of America and Gourmet magazine. Participants in the survey identified culinary travel as visiting locations to enjoy local food and wine. Forty-six percent of the survey’s respondents deliberately scheduled their travels based on the availability of culinary activities, while 28 percent said they sought out culinary activities while on their travels, but they were not necessarily a factor in making a choice. O Luxury Hotelier | September 2007 | www.LuxuryHotelier.com http://www.LuxuryHotelier.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Luxury Hotelier - September 2007

EDITOR’S LETTER PUBLISHER’S LETTER INFORM NETWORK PERSONALITIES INSIGHT INSIGHT PROPERTIES ROPERTIES INSPIRE DELIVER PROTOCOLS INSIGHT INNOVATE DEVELOPMENT INDULGE INSIGHT CONNECT UPDATE DOSSIER

Luxury Hotelier - September 2007

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