Condo prices are taking a beating at Trump’s Chicago tower

Prices are down at the Trump International Hotel & Tower in Chicago. They’re down big-time.

Hotel rooms in the 98-story building can be purchased for less than $200,000 these days, though real estate experts might caution you against pulling the trigger: After hotel management fees, taxes and interest on the loan, there likely wouldn’t be much rental income on the room, Gail Lissner managing director at Integra Realty Resources, told the Chicago Sun-Times.

That’s to say nothing of the sputtering hotel market, which hasn’t recovered from the pandemic.

Condo owners at 401 N. Wabash have traditionally fared better than hotel room owners. But according to Lissner’s numbers, sales of the condo units in the first half of 2020 averaged $566 a foot, down 42 percent from the same period two years ago and 25 percent from 2019.

Typically, condo units at the property could command about $800 a foot, among the pricier figures for condo buildings in Chicago.

The problem, as you might have guessed, is the name. Though the overall condo market downtown is softening, the bigger issue is the letters T-R-U-M-P on the bottom of the tower, Lissner told the Sun-Times.

“It’s a very nice property, and they operate it well,” Lissner told the paper. “The staff is extremely solicitous and well-trained. The negative is the name. It’s like a lightning rod.”

Last year, an investigation by The Real Deal found that the Trump International Hotel & Tower was the biggest retail failure in the city’s modern history.

[Sun-Times] — James Kleimann