Gencom and Lehman Brothers Sell Hotel Portfolio to RLJ Real Estate Fund III
AUGUST 15, 2008. Gencom Group, the Miami-based international and domestic development and investment firm, in partnership with Lehman Brothers Real Estate Partners, today announced the sale of a portfolio of six Hyatt Summerfield Suites hotels to RLJ Real Estate Fund III, LP ("RLJ"), an affiliate of RLJ Development, LLC, a privately held hotel real estate investment company.
"We are pleased to have completed this transaction with RLJ," said Karim Alibhai, founder and principal of Gencom Group. "The sale is consistent with our original business plan of identifying, repositioning and disposing of assets at significant returns".
"This is the first acquisition for the RLJ Real Estate Fund III," stated Thomas J. Baltimore, Jr., president of RLJ. "The purchase is timely because the properties are just coming off complete renovations and conversions to the Hyatt Summerfield Suites brand. We look forward to expanding our relationship with Global Hyatt as the awareness of this brand grows across the country."
RLJ has retained Aimbridge Hospitality to manage the three hotels in the Dallas area and White Lodging Services to manage the hotels in Austin, Colorado Springs and Houston.
The portfolio sale brings to a close a structured venture by Gencom Group and Lehman Brothers Real Estate Partners that began with the acquisition of 50 percent of the Summerfield brand and six Summerfield Suites Hotels from Wyndham International in 2004. Following on that transaction, the Gencom Group/Lehman Brothers Real Estate Partners partnership acquired nine Bradford Home Suites Hotels in March 2006. These properties are located in Dallas, Houston, Austin, Denver and Colorado Springs, Colorado. Six of the properties, now part of the RLJ acquisition, were then re-flagged under the Hyatt Summerfield Suites brand. Over the past three years, the Summerfield brand has significantly strengthened by its inclusion in the Global Hyatt family.
"We look forward to continuing our long-standing and successful relationship with Lehman Brothers and Lehman Brothers Real Estate Partners and to the pursuit of similar opportunities in the luxury and extended-stay hospitality, mixed-use arena," concluded Alibhai.
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