Host Hotels Sells Metro Center Marriott To California Investor
The largest U.S. hospitality REIT has offloaded a hotel in the heart of D.C. that it had owned for three decades.
An affiliate of Bethesda-based Host Hotels & Resorts sold the Washington Marriott at Metro Center at 775 12th St. NW to Newport Beach, California-based T2 Hospitality this week, according to D.C. deed records.
The recorded price was $128M, but for hotels, the price recorded often doesn't include the value of hotel furniture and fixtures. The purchase appears to be T2's first in D.C.
The 454-room hotel sits next to a vacant office building that BXP is demolishing to replace with a 320K SF trophy office. It is also a door down from one of the entrances to the Metro Center Metro station.
The sale is one of the biggest of a hotel in D.C. this year and eclipses DiamondRock Hospitality Co.'s $92M February sale of The Westin Washington, D.C. City Center.
The sale appears to have been financed by the seller. T2 secured a $114M loan for the purchase from Host Holding Business Trust, deed records show. HMC Retirement Properties, a Host subsidiary, acquired the property in 1994 when it was the Metro Center Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza Hotel.
Host declined to comment on the sale, and T2 Hospitality didn't respond to requests for comment. The Washington Business Journal first reported the sale.
T2 Hospitality owns 13 hotels with just over 2,000 rooms, according to its website. All are in California, except for one in Denver.
At the end of June, Host owned 80 hotels nationwide and five properties in D.C.'s central business district, totaling 3,245 rooms, according to its quarterly filings.
At the beginning of the year, Host was reportedly looking to sell a more than 10-property portfolio valued at more than $1B, though those properties weren't revealed and it isn't clear if the Washington Marriott was in the group.
