Exclusive: $100M portfolio of Tampa Bay hotels on the market
By Ashley Gurbal Kritzer
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Mar 2, 2015

A portfolio of five Tampa Bay hotels, including a waterfront property once targeted for a major redevelopment, is on the market.

Equity Management Partners Inc. has renovated all of the properties over the last several years, Principal Ben Mallah said.

"Our company's moving in the direction now where we don't want to be in it for the long term," Mallah said.

The portfolio includes the following:

Best Western Bay Harbor, 261 rooms, 7700 Courtney Campbell Causeway, Tampa. At the height of the real estate market, a developer targeted this property for a redevelopment into the Bay region's first Ritz-Carlton, but those plans collapsed when the market crashed. The money Mallah has invested in this property could potentially make a redevelopment too costly - when those plans were in the works before, the hotel was in disrepair and would have been far less expensive. Mallah has invested $5 million in the hotel and the on-site Hogan's Beach Restaurant, a Hulk Hogan-themed bar and restaurant.

Ramada Westshore, 237 rooms, 1200 N. West Shore Blvd, Tampa

Fairfield by Marriott, 82 suites, 12260 Morris Bridge Road, Temple Terrace

Baymont Inn and Suites Busch Gardens, 150 suites, 3001 University Center Drive, Tampa

Ramada Clearwater Airport, 120 rooms, 3580 Ulmerton Road, Clearwater

"They're all very good, strong operating properties," Mallah said.

Mallah and his team are asking $100 million for the portfolio and expect to market it for at least the next month.

Large commercial properties typically aren't brought to market with asking prices, but Mallah said he'd rather expedite the negotiation process.

The asking price breaks down to $117,650 per hotel room. The InterContinental Tampa sold for $124,500 per room in January, though the buyer is planning $7 million in upgrades. At the high end of the spectrum, Hilton Clearwater Beach sold for more than $300,000 per room, and Tampa Bay Lightning Owner Jeff Vinik paid more than $275,000 per room last fall for the Tampa Marriott Waterside Hotel and Marina.

"We don't want a lot of people coming to us trying to waste their time or our time with ridiculously low offers," Mallah said, "and it's not a fire sale. It's a not a distressed sale."

Tampa Bay's hospitality market has seen a good amount of activity in the last 12 months, between investment sales and development plans. Hotel occupancy numbers have been improving steadily - Hillsborough County collected a record bed tax in December, according to Visit Tampa Bay. Investors are also interested in the market as higher prices and lower returns in gateway markets entice them to secondary markets like Tampa.

"We're open to anything that makes sense," Mallah said, " but of course it would be an ideal situation for us to sell it as a package."

Ashley Gurbal Kritzer is a reporter for the Tampa Bay Business Journal.