UK developer pays $127M for Marina del Rey hotel

A U.K.-based developer has splashed down in Marina del Rey.

London & Regional Properties bought the Hotel MdR this month from Channel West Group for $127 million, according to CoStar. The 238-key hotel sits on just under five acres outside the neighborhood’s namesake marina.

The hotel is currently branded as a DoubleTree, a franchise owned by Hilton. Channel West Group — a joint venture between Beverly Hills-based Arris Investments and San Clemente’s Evolution Hospitality — renovated and rebranded the hotel from a Courtyard by Marriott. The joint-venture purchased the hotel the year before for $52.5 million.

London & Regional took out a five-year floating-rate mortgage with a German lender, Dallas-based brokerage HFF Inc., HFF told the Los Angeles Business Journal. HFF Managing Director Scott Hall said the hotel’s proximity to Silicon Beach is part of its appeal, and that “it will continue to benefit from continued demand growth and very little new competitive supply.”

While most tech companies are concentrated in Santa Monica, Venice and Playa Vista, some big names are making moves into Marina del Rey as well. Tesla signed a 131,000-square-foot lease at the former Omnicom building on Alla Road, less than a mile from the Hotel MdR.

The Hotel MdR property is well-placed as prime real estate is scooped up, redeveloped, and leased in many of Marina del Rey’s neighboring communities, including Playa Vista to the east. Facebook is in advanced discussions to lease around 122,000 square feet at the Tishman Speyer-owned Brickyard campus there. Google will move into the cavernous, 319,000-square-foot Spruce Goose aircraft hangar this fall.

Of course, developers are coming too. Steaven Jones Development Company and Creative Office Properties announced a large mixed-use campus just north of Lincoln Boulevard. It will include 65,000 square feet of creative office space, 49 apartments, and 2,000 square feet of restaurant space.

[LABJ] – Dennis Lynch