A 249-room beachfront resort on Hawaii's Big Island is drawing fresh attention not just for its ocean views, but also for what its financing reveals about the growing divide taking place nationally between ultra-luxury properties and the rest of the hotel market.
FS Trust 2026-HULA, a $650 million commercial mortgage-backed securities transaction backed by the Four Seasons Resort Hualalai, is scheduled to close March 17, according to Morningstar DBRS, the bond-rating firm evaluating the offering. JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs are to co-originate the two-year, floating-rate, interest-only loan.
The Four Seasons Resort Hualalai sits on 507 acres along the Kona-Kohala coast, about 15 minutes from Ellison Onizuka Kona International Airport. The resort opened in 1996 and holds the only AAA Five Diamond and Forbes Five Star designations on Hawaii's Big Island, according to the Morningstar report.
“Hotel performance in 2025 highlights a widening divide between luxury-heavy outer islands, which are regaining traction.”
At the moment, the U.S. hotel industry faces near-flat growth — CoStar forecast revenue per available room, or RevPAR, gains of just 0.5% nationally in 2026. Meanwhile, the Four Seasons Resort Hualalai posted RevPAR growth of 12.8% in 2025, according to Morningstar.
That gap is widening, not narrowing. It signals that a small tier of ultra-luxury assets is effectively decoupling from the broader U.S. lodging market — and that institutional capital is taking notice.
In Hawaii specifically, “hotel performance in 2025 highlights a widening divide between luxury-heavy outer islands, which are regaining traction,” Michael Stathokostopoulos, senior director of hospitality analytics for CoStar, said.
While resort-driven, luxury-heavy outer-island hospitality sites are growing occupancy and rates, the convention- and international travel-dependent hotel base on the densely populated island of Oahu continues to face structural challenges heading into 2026, Stathokostopoulos said.
“On a trailing 12-month basis ending December 2025, the Hawaii-Kauai Islands were the only markets in the state to record meaningful year-over-year RevPAR growth, advancing 6%. Among individual islands, Hawaii Island (Big Island) led performance growth at 7.7%.”
Both Maui and the Hawaii-Kauai Islands benefit from a luxury-heavy inventory, with about 20% of rooms in the luxury segment, Stathokostopoulos added.
“These high-end resorts continue to attract affluent travelers who remain less sensitive to economic uncertainty, supporting rate strength even as broader leisure demand softens,” he said.
Morningstar cited the resort’s “loyal base of high-net-worth repeat clientele” as a key structural advantage. The firm noted that repeat guests “create a competitive moat, as the property’s reputation, service standards, and exclusivity are extremely difficult for competing resorts to replicate.”
The transaction borrower is BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank backed by Dell Technologies founder Michael Dell.
BDT & MSD is not simply refinancing. The new $650 million mortgage replaces a $400 million CMBS loan from 2024 and a $235 million JPMorgan balance sheet loan — a 62.5% increase in debt load. The sponsor is also cashing out about $4.5 million in equity.
The increased debt load is in line with significant increase in property value. The Four Seasons Resort Hualalai was appraised at $854 million two years ago and appraised this year at $1.19 billion, according to Morningstar.
The refinancing comes after BDT & MSD completed a $17.6 million renovation of the resort’s signature ‘ULU restaurant and opened NOIO, a new second-floor sushi lounge. The sponsor has invested $229.8 million — roughly $923,000 per key — in the property since 2019.