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1. RIU acquires The Westminster for £290 million
Mallorca, Spain-based RIU Hotels & Resorts has acquired the 494-room Westminster, Curio Collection by Hilton in London from a partnership consisting of BHP, PPF Real Estate and Westmont Hospitality, according to business advisory JLL, which helped broker the deal. According to investment bank AHV Associates, the price was £290 million ($390 million) or £587,000 ($789,000) per key.
According to CoStar data, the hotel last sold in January 2017 when Westmont and its partners acquired it for £187.5 million or approximately £379,5000 per key. Thus, the hotel’s new sale represents more than a 50% rise in value.
A press release from RIU did not mention the sale price but said the hotel is now named the Hotel RIU Plaza London The Westminster. The property is very close to the Houses of Parliament. RIU added that the hotel was built in 2003 and underwent a complete renovation in 2021, when it joined Curio Collection by Hilton. The hotel is RIU’s second in London.
2. MCR Hotels' planned Soho House buy hits snag
MCR Hotels' plans to acquire all remaining shares in hotel and membership club brand Soho House have hit a bump in the road, according to a Securities & Exchange Commission filing. First announced on Aug. 15, the $200 million deal would take Soho House private. On Jan. 5, MCR said it wouldn't be able to fund its closing commitment by today's closing date, according to the SEC filing.
Company officials are scrambling to save the deal, writes CoStar News' Terence Baker. Soho House's share price on the New York Stock Exchange was trading approximately 9.6% down during early Friday trading. The Wall Street Journal reports Soho House shareholder Goldman Sachs Asset Management is contributing some of its shares to "help cover the funding shortage."
3. US court rules on hotel room privacy case
The Third Circuit of the US Court of Appeals has delivered its verdict on Jan. 8 that a guest’s “expectation of privacy in [a] hotel room … after checkout time was not objectively reasonable,” rejecting said guest’s argument that he “retained a Fourth Amendment privacy interest in the room because he had not formally checked out,” according to Justia.
The case — USA v. Mendoza, No. 25-1154 — came about after a guest didn't check out at the stated checkout time and hotel staff entered the guest's room and discovered packages containing what they believed contained drugs. The police were called, and when the guest returned to the hotel, he was arrested. The court summarized the case, stating that “absent any communication about a late checkout or ambiguous circumstances, society does not recognize an expectation of privacy in a hotel room well after checkout time.”
4. Storm Goretti leaves thousands in UK without power
Storm Goretti swept across parts of the United Kingdom on the night of Jan. 8 and left thousands of people and businesses without power. The storm's wind speed reached nearly 100 miles per hour, according to the BBC, which added that residents in the southwest of England were sent emergency phone alerts underlining the storm posed “danger to life” and that up to 50,000 people currently remained with no power.
The Midlands of England are expected to get the brunt of the system, with officials there saying the region is “bracing for the worst snow in a decade, with 30 centimeters (11 inches) expected to fall. That area’s principal airport, Birmingham Airport, closed due to the storm, but at press time its officials had posted a message on its website that said “reduced runway operations have resumed.”
5. UK government backtracks on pub business rates, but not for those hotels
The U.K. government on Jan. 9 backtracked on its policy to increase business rates on pubs that would have cost the hospitality industry approximately £300 million, with newspaper The Guardian reporting that Rachel Reeves, the chancellor of the exchequer, “was finalizing a support package for the struggling industry that would include reductions to business rates for pubs, which had been facing a 76% rise on average over the next three years.”
No mention has been made on business rates faced by hotels, but the newspaper added that “the government is now likely to come under pressure from other sectors of the hospitality industry.”
"Whitbread, which owns hotels pubs and restaurants, said it would have to pay between £40 million and £50 million more in tax as a result,” The Guardian reports.
UKHospitality, the country’s principal membership and lobbying organization, has long stated an overhaul to business rates is needed, adding that hotels and pubs in the U.K. are under huge pressure from such extra operations costs.