After a three-year stay, the owners of the Hotel Monaco downtown have sold the boutique property along with two others of the same name for nearly $190 million to a Connecticut- based real estate investment firm.
The sale of the Denver, Chicago and Salt Lake City hotels was announced Tuesday by the new owner, Cornerstone Real Estate Advisers, based in Hartford, Conn.
Financing for the deal came from Principal Financial Group, a Des Moines, Iowa-based insurance and investment company, people familiar with the sale said.
Cornerstone is owned by Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. and tucks the Monaco properties into a management portfolio that tops $9.6 billion in public and private real estate, 35 percent of it in hotels, according to its website.
The 189-room Monaco in Denver last sold in January 2005 for a reported $43.5 million — a record at $230,000 per room — to PRISA Hotel LLC, a Prudential Real Estate Investors fund. Breakout figures for Tuesday’s sale were not disclosed.
PRISA’s sale on Tuesday was brokered by Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels, which also brokered PRISA’s purchase in 2005.
The Monacos are operated by former owner Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants LLC of San Francisco, which penned a multiyear management deal when it sold the properties to PRISA.
That contract will continue with the new owners.
“This is a validation that Denver is perceived as a safe and secure, high-quality market,” said Alan Tantleff, executive vice president for Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels, the Chicago firm that handled the sale. “These three hotels had a strong, steady stream of income and a growing occupancy that made it attractive to the buyer.”
The Monaco in Chicago has 192 rooms, and the Salt Lake City hotel is the largest of the three sold sites with 225 rooms.
David Migoya: 303-954-1506 or dmigoya@denverpost.com
