With fewer hotel rooms under construction, hotel developers hope the reduction in new rooms will help to revive the hospitality industry.

The October 2009 STR/TWR/Dodge Construction Pipeline Report noted that the total active U.S. hotel development pipeline includes 4,089 projects comprising 435,265 rooms.

This represents a 32.7 percent decrease in the number of rooms in the total active pipeline — which includes projects in the construction, final planning and planning stages, but not in the pre planning stage — compared to October 2008.

“The number of rooms in construction fell 41.2 percent from the same time last year,” said Duane Vinson, vice president at STR. A number of planned hotels have ground to a halt in Manhattan including the Lower East Side’s 180 Ludlow Street.
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From left to right: Kent Swig, Yair Levy, Harry Macklowe and Aby Rosen could be personally liable to lenders.

From the November issue: Contrary to popular belief, commercial lenders did not throw out all of their standards in the recent cycle of easy credit.
When developer Aby Rosen structured his $133 million loan for the
acquisition and development of the Shangri-La hotel at 614 Lexington
Avenue in April 2007, the mortgage document included a personal
guaranty to cover losses in the event of a default. Similarly, when Kent Swig negotiated $49 million in loans with
Lehman Brothers Holdings to develop a hotel and condo project at 45
Broad Street in the Financial District in 2006 and 2007, the bank
demanded a similar guaranty in the mortgage documents.
And other big-time borrowers such as developer Yair Levy and
investor Steven Elghanayan have made the same types of commitments to
convince banks to make loans on their projects. [more]

The lenders on Midtown’s Shangri-La Hotel have sued developer RFR Holding partners Aby Rosen and Michael Fuchs for at least $145.6 million. The lenders, ING Real Estate Finance and Swedbank AG, filed to foreclose on the hotel last month, but last week they amended the complaint to make Rosen and Fuchs personally liable for the loan and other fees. The developers were planning to build the Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts’ tower at 610 Lexington Avenue at 53rd Street. [more]

The lenders for the Midtown development where Aby Rosen’s RFR Holding
was slated to build Shangri-La Hotel, New York, have filed to foreclose
on $144.2 million in loans and fees used to buy, plan and develop the
site, court records say. ING Real Estate Finance and Swedbank sued to foreclose on the loan to
Park Avenue Hotel Acquisition, a company registered at the address of
developer Aby Rosen’s RFR Holding, which was slated to develop the
Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts’ tower at 610 Lexington Avenue, at 53rd
Street. The borrower was unable to refinance its loan by an April 8 deadline,
and so ING determined the loan was in default on June 15, the filing
says. [more]