Yucaipa Companies lands $100 million refi for Line Hotel

Ron Burkle’s Yucaipa Companies has refinanced its Line Hotel in Koreatown with $100 million from Corten Real Estate Partners.

The West Hollywood-based investment firm received the cash infusion from the Delaware company for its 384-room boutique hotel at 3515 Wilshire Blvd., the Commercial Observer reported. It marks the second refinancing of the hotel in five years.

Brandon Flury, principal of Corten Real Estate, said Line LA was “a unique lifestyle hospitality asset in a high barrier-to-entry market that is beginning to recover from the
pandemic.

“We look forward to seeing the hotel restabilize and reach its full potential under the sponsor’s blue-chip stewardship,” he said.

The mid-century modern hotel, which opened as a Hyatt in 1964, was once the temporary home of author-journalist Hunter S. Thompson. Amenities include a pool on its second-floor garden terrace, restaurant and event venues.

Yucaipa bought the 12-story tower in 2011 for $34.58 million, then tapped Los Angeles-based designer Sean Knibb to feature stripped-down concrete walls and an industrial-chic look.

It reopened in 2014 as the Line Hotel, a buzzy Koreatown hotspot managed by Sydell Group, a New York-based hotel management company co-founded by Burkle and Andrew Zobler that’s also behind the Ace and NoMad hotels in Manhattan. L.A. chef Roy Choi ran the restaurant.

Three years later, Yucaipa refinanced the hotel with a $93 million floating-rate mortgage from Natixis, a French corporate and investment bank. The money was used to refinance a renovation loan from Deutsche Bank after the multimillion-dollar makeover of the hotel.

It was also used to fund Yucaipa’s repositioning of the first-floor lobby and restaurant, and to upgrade the hotel ballroom.

Its latest round of financing was arranged by Institutional Property Advisors, ​​a division of Marcus & Millichap, based in Calabasas, with a team led by Jordan Ray, Steven Buchwald, Jamie Matheny and Lexington Henn.

“The property is strategically located in Koreatown right between Hollywood and Downtown LA. Locals and guests love the restaurants, bars and active lobby scene. It’s a great midway point to meet in L.A.” Ray said. “We created a market and structured a very attractive deal that met the client’s needs and vision for the asset.”

Last fall, hotel bookings across Los Angeles led the nation when hotel bookings reached 100-percent of their 2019, pre-pandemic levels, compared with a national average of 90 percent.

[Commercial Observer] – Dana Bartholomew

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