If, as expected by market pros, the 336-room luxury hotel north of Union Square is listed in coming weeks, it could fetch $168 million – or $500,000 a room, according to trade publication Real Estate Alert.

What could be making market watchers quiver with anticipation is a recent earnings call by the current owner, Host Hotels Resorts. CEO Edward Walter said the real estate investment trust is considering selling hotels whose market value has recovered from the depths of the recession, “so that we can feel comfortable that we’re not leaving a material amount of value on the table by selling in 2012.”

As we noted last week, the San Francisco hotel market has rebounded, with some of the biggest price increases in the country in 2011, and it’s likely to get even hotter in 2012. The $168 million figure comes close to the $172 million the Westin San Francisco - which has twice as many rooms as the Ritz-Carlton – went for last year.

Host Hotels, which owns six other hotels in the Bay Area, did not return a call requesting comment Monday. The REIT, headquartered in Bethesda, Md., controls in whole or part about 72,000 rooms in the United States and overseas. It recorded $1.66 billion in revenue last year.

So, why would Host Hotels let go of its San Francisco trophy?

“They are looking to capitalize on opportunistic values, such as the other ones we’re seeing in San Francisco,” said Alan Reay, president of Atlas Hospitality Group, an industry research and consultancy company in Irvine. “By selling the Ritz-Carlton here, they could deploy capital in markets where they see better buying opportunities.”

Dry hole: As of next month, San Francisco will be without a Gordon Biersch Brewery Restaurant for the foreseeable future.

Closing time is April 28 when its lease, at the Hills Plaza complex on the Embarcadero, is up.

“We couldn’t come to an agreement with the landlord,” said Carrie Kleban, chief marketing officer of CraftWorks Restaurants and Breweries, which owns Gordon Biersch. The landlord, Morgan Stanley, bought Hills Plaza from Shorenstein Properties for $198 million in 2004.

CraftWorks, headquartered in Tennessee, is looking for another spot in San Francisco, preferably close to the Hills Bros. Coffee building where the brew pub has operated for the past 20 years. “We’re working fast and furiously, but it may take a little time,” Kleban said.

It’s also looking to relocate the approximately 80 employees, some of whom will go to the two other Bay Area Gordon Biersch Breweries, in Palo Alto and San Jose. Others will be getting “transition” assistance from an agency affiliated with the California Employment Development Department.

Founded in the Bay Area in 1988, Gordon Biersch has 35 outlets in the United States and Asia. How long should San Franciscans wait for it to return to San Francisco? “We love San Francisco, but it’s all about real estate availability,” Kleban said.

And, presumably, the rent.

Compare and contrast: The Hills Bros. Coffee building, which dates to 1926, is No. 157 on San Francisco’s list of historical landmarks. As part of its campaign to resist moving now that its lease is up, the Gold Dust Lounge, which opened in 1966 on Powell Street, is attempting to be included in that august company.

It probably shouldn’t count on the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce as one of its supporters.

In a letter to the city’s Historic Preservation Commission, the chamber said the Gold Dust’s request “is an attempt to politicize a simple landlord-tenant relationship. The Gold Dust Lounge has known for years that their lease would be coming to an end and are clearly applying to the Commission as a last ditch effort to stall an eviction process that has been a long time coming. Approving this would be a true misuse of the term ‘landmark’ in San Francisco.”

Oh, and as reported in today’s Metro section, Handlery Hotels, the owners of the building that houses the Gold Dust, filed an unlawful detainer suit against the bar’s proprietors for failing to vacate the premises by Saturday, as called for in the lease.

New life from north of the border: As of today, Canadian life sciences companies have a home at San Francisco’s biotech hub in Mission Bay.

Four Canadian companies will be setting up shop at the Canadian Technology Accelerator on UCSF’s Mission Bay campus. Three are based in Vancouver: Aquinox Pharmaceuticals, which focuses on small molecule therapeutics; BioMark, which specializes in portable screening devices to detect cancers; and Precision NanoSystems, which has come up with ways to deliver drugs intravenously using nanotechnology. The fourth, Clinisys, headquartered in Edmonton, Alberta, develops digital medical record systems.

Canadian ambassador Gary Doer will be on hand with Mayor Ed Lee to open the incubator at UCSF’s California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3). “This partnership marries Canada’s world-class basic research institutions and life sciences companies with QB3′s proven expertise in translating science to commercial success,” said Doer.

“Faster commercialization means greater ROI, and that means greater success for both our economies.”

Blogging at www.sfgate.com/columns/bottomline. Facebook: sfg.ly/doACKM. Twitter: @andrewsross. bottomline@sfchronicle.com

This article appeared on page D – 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

Article source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/03/13/BU6T1NJGVV.DTL

SAN FRANCISCO, Nov 16, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) –
HFF announced today that it has closed the portfolio sale of 398 rooms
consisting of three iconic, generational hotels in the San Francisco Bay
area — The Huntington Hotel in San Francisco, and the La Playa Hotel and
Cottages-by-the-Sea in Carmel-by-the-Sea, in which the seller held a fee
interest in the properties, as well as the Galleria Park Hotel in San
Francisco, in which the seller held a leased-fee interest in the land
beneath the hotel.

HFF marketed the hotels on behalf of the seller, Nob Hill Properties,
Inc. The properties were purchased by four separate investors. Grace
International Pte Ltd, based in Singapore, purchased The Huntington
Hotel (140 rooms), Classic Hotels and Resorts, a subsidiary of Grossman
Company Properties purchased La Playa Hotel (75 rooms and one cottage),
Carmel Cottages, LLC purchased Cottages-by-the-Sea (five cottages), and
an affiliate of Interwest Capital Corporation purchased the Galleria
Park Hotel (177 rooms).

The Huntington Hotel, located at 1075 California Street atop Nob Hill in
San Francisco, is situated adjacent to Grace Cathedral and Huntington
Park as well as other luxury hotels including the Fairmont, Mark Hopkins
and the Ritz Carlton. The 12-story property, which is a short distance
from the Financial District and Union Square shopping area, has 140
rooms, conference and meeting room facilities, the “award winning” Big 4
Restaurant, and Nob Hill Spa, named by the San Francisco Chronicle as
“one of the most luxurious spas in the city.” The hotel was sold
unencumbered by management and any franchise affiliation.

La Playa Hotel, a boutique Mediterranean-style resort, is located two
blocks from Carmel Beach and Ocean Avenue in Carmel-by-the-Sea. The
historic resort is also less than two miles from a number of
“world-renowned” golf courses including Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill and
Cypress Point. La Playa Hotel has 75 rooms plus one, stand-alone
cottage, the Terrace Grill and five meeting rooms. The resort was sold
unencumbered by management and any franchise affiliation.

Cottages-by-the-Sea is a cluster of five “very unique” one- to
three-bedroom cottages ranging in size from 448 to 2,163 square feet.
Cottages-by-the-Sea is located across the street from La Playa Hotel and
will be operated separately from La Playa Hotel.

The Galleria Park Hotel, located at 191 Sutter Street in San Francisco,
is nestled between Union Square and the Financial District. The 177-room
hotel is managed by Joie de Vivre Hospitality.

The HFF investment sales team representing Nob Hill Properties, Inc.
included senior managing directors Daniel Peek, Michael Leggett and
Gerry Rohm and managing director Holden Lim.

Holliday Fenoglio Fowler, LP (“HFF”) and HFF Securities LP (“HFFS”) are
owned by HFF, Inc.


/quotes/zigman/442188/quotes/nls/hf HF
-1.34%



. HFF operates out of 19 offices nationwide
and is a leading provider of commercial real estate and capital markets
services to the U.S. commercial real estate industry. HFF together with
its affiliate HFFS offer clients a fully integrated national capital
markets platform including debt placement, investment sales, advisory
services, structured finance, private equity, loan sales, and commercial
loan servicing.
www.hfflp.com .

Holliday Fenoglio Fowler, L.P., acting by and through Holliday GP Corp.,
a real estate broker licensed with the California Department of Real
Estate, License Number 01385740.

SOURCE: HFF

        HFF
        Holden Lim, (415) 276-6948
        CA Lic. (#01328565)
        Managing Director
        hlim@hfflp.com
        or
        Gerry Rohm, (415) 276-6935
        CA Lic. (# 01367742)
        Senior Managing Director
        grohm@hfflp.com
        or
        Kristen Murphy, (713) 852-3500
        Associate Director, Marketing
        krmurphy@hfflp.com

Copyright Business Wire 2011

/quotes/zigman/442188/quotes/nls/hf

Add HF to portfolio

HF

Article source: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/hff-closes-portfolio-sale-of-three-iconic-san-francisco-bay-area-hotels-in-four-separate-transactions-2011-11-16