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1. Brookfield invests $150 million in two New Zealand hotels
New York City-based Brookfield Asset Management has acquired two hotels in New Zealand for $250 million New Zealand dollars ($148.3 million), including repositioning costs. The seller is Auckland-based NZ Hotel Holdings, and the two hotels are the 280-room Rydges Wellington in the New Zealand capital and the 84-room Sofitel Queenstown.
Ruban Kaneshamoorthy, Brookfield’s co-head of Australia real estate, said of the two assets that the firm sees “significant potential to enhance their performance through active asset management and targeted capital investment. We continue to look for opportunities to deploy further global capital into New Zealand.”
2. US airport screening delays worsen
Several airports in the U.S. have warned travelers to expect longer wait times at security checkpoints due to the partial government shutdown. As a result, passengers are advised to arrive four hours before their scheduled departures, according to The Wall Street Journal. The newspaper said airports, including those in Atlanta, Charlotte, Houston and New Orleans, anticipate the problems to continue at least until the end of the upcoming spring-break season, which ends on March 26.
“The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the Transportation Security Administration, has been largely shut down since Feb. 14 when federal funding lapsed without a new appropriation from Congress,” The WSJ reports. Approximately 50,000 TSA staff received a partial paycheck on Feb. 28 [but] are set to miss their first full paycheck this week.
3. Hotelier reveals playbook on big San Francisco deal
In a CoStar News Hotels podcast, Michelle Russo, founder and CEO of HotelAVE, dove into the details of the receivership process of the Parc 55 and Hilton Union Square hotels. In 2023, Park Hotels & Resorts walked away from the two hotels rather than continue paying $725 million in debt.
New York City-based investment funds Newbond and Conversant later acquired the two San Francisco hotels, and that deal was named transaction of the year at the recent Americas Lodging Investment Summit.
“They were beasts of assets. Two, thousand-plus-room properties with lots of moving parts. I have to say Park was really cooperative in assisting us in the transition,” Russo said.
4. Africa hotel pipeline hits record high
Across the continent, Africa has a record 123,846 rooms in 675 hotels in development, up 18.6% year over year, or 12.2% on a same-store basis, according to W Hospitality Group’s annual Hotel Chain Development Pipelines in Africa report.
Trevor Ward, W Hospitality Group’s managing director and the author of the report, said the data reveals “Africa’s hotel development story is being driven by a handful of high-performing markets, with Egypt firmly at the forefront in both signings and projected openings.”
He said Egypt leads the list with 45,984 rooms in 185 hotels, more than one-third of the entire African pipeline and more than four times the number in second-placed Morocco, which has 10,606 rooms in its pipeline. The other three markets leading pipeline in Africa are Nigeria (8,480 rooms in 57 hotels), Kenya (6,190 rooms in 35 hotels) and Ethiopia (5,964 rooms in 34 hotels).
5. Iran war costing tourism $600 million per day
The World Travel & Tourism Council estimates that the ongoing conflict in the Middle East between the U.S. and Israel against Iran is costing the travel and tourism sector $600 million per day in international visitor spending “as disruptions to air travel, traveler confidence and regional connectivity affect demand.” The WTTC added the region accounts for 5% of global international arrivals and 14% of global international transit traffic.
Airport hubs in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Doha and Bahrain process on average 526,000 passengers per day. The WTTC's estimate is based on its pre-conflict mathematics that the Middle East had been calculated to have earned a “projected $207 billion in international visitor spending across the region [in 2026].”