St. Regis Chicago Hotel Lands $125M Refinancing

The owners of the St. Regis Chicago hotel landed a $125 million refinancing from Banco Inbursa, a signal of growing investor confidence in the Windy City’s lodging sector as several of its properties have been grappling with financial distress.

The new loan retires a $76 million debt that Miami-based Gencom and Denver-based GD Holdings took out from Minneapolis-based Värde Partners to finance the purchase in May 2023, Gencom said in a press release Monday.

The deal will allow Gencom and GD Holdings to pull out roughly $49 million against the 192-key hotel at 363 East Wacker Drive. The hotel occupies the first 11 floors of the 101-story Jeanne Gang-designed skyscraper in the Loop. The joint venture bought the hotel in 2023 for $119 million, according to public records, though industry insiders pegged the total value of the deal at that time as around $134 million, The Real Deal previously reported.

Gencom founder Karim Alibhai said in a statement the financing deal reflects the operating success of the hotel. The St. Regis was the first luxury hotel to open in downtown Chicago in over a decade, and it “has resonated with both business and leisure travelers,” Alibhai said.

The refinancing is the fourth deal Gencom has completed with Banco Inbursa, the Mexico City-based commercial bank controlled by billionaire Carlos Slim, Gencom said in the press release. GD Holdings is the American real estate investment arm of Grupo Denim, the Mexican clothing company run by Salomon Juan Marcos Villarreal that has invested heavily in the St. Regis Chicago property.

Gencom and GD Holdings were represented by Stearns Weaver Miller, while Banco Inbursa was advised by Gibson Dunn, the press release said.

The financing deal reflects the renewed lender appetite for hotels, with investments increasing globally 22 percent from 2023 levels, according to a February JLL report. The report noted trophy properties are emerging as a target for investments.

The new financing also comes as Chicago hotel traffic is moving past the pandemic-era slump that led to rising vacancy and distress for large hotels like the Palmer House and the 21c Museum Hotel. Hotels in the Central Business District booked nearly 3.6 million room nights from June through August 2025, according to the city’s lodging and convention industry marketing organization Choose Chicago, surpassing the 2019 high and setting a record $949 million in hotel revenue.

The St. Regis hotel and residential portions of the tower have changed hands repeatedly since the building finished construction. The hotel was originally planned to open under the Wanda Vista brand and owned by Chinese investment firm Dalian Wanda Group. Wanda sold its stake to Magellan in 2020 amid Chinese government pressure on foreign real estate investment, but retained a few dozen residential condos that it’s now looking to sell. Wanda transferred 16 of those condos to Sony to settle an intellectual property dispute over the “Octonauts” TV show in December.

Chicago-based Magellan, the skyscraper’s primary developer, sold the hotel to Gencom and GD Holdings in 2023, while maintaining a minority stake, TRD reported.

Separate from its stake in the hotel, GD Holdings spent $117.5 million acquiring unsold luxury condos at the St. Regis Chicago in 2024, also from Magellan. GD Holdings has sold 48 of the 84 units in its bulk holdings for a combined $131 million so far, according to property records.

Several of the firm’s condos are for sale on public listing websites, including a 73rd-floor penthouse that was listed Monday for $8.4 million.