Wurzak buys Deerfield Beach DoubleTree for $27M

Acquisition marks its fourth Broward County hotel

100 Fairway Drive, Deerfield Beach with Ally Visram and Howard Wurzak (Wurzak Hotel Group, Google Maps)
100 Fairway Drive, Deerfield Beach with Ally Visram and Howard Wurzak (Wurzak Hotel Group, Google Maps)

Wurzak Hotel Group is bringing a little Philadelphia-style hospitality to Deerfield Beach.

The firm bought the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Deerfield Beach-Boca Raton for $27 million, marking its fourth hotel acquisition in Broward County.

Led by the father-son duo Howard and Jake Wurzak, the Philadelphia-based firm bought the 221-room hotel at 100 Fairway Drive from Vista Myrtle Beach LP, an affiliate of Vista Group, records show. The price equates to $122,000 per key.

Wurzak secured a $27.5 million loan from Amerant Bank to finance its purchase of the 6.2-acre property, records show.

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Vista had paid $22.3 million for the hotel in 2018, or $101,000 per key. The 162,600-square-foot hotel was built in 1985, and has 16,800 square feet of event space and 10 meeting rooms.

Brothers Amin and Ally Visram head the Binghamton, N.Y.-based Vista property management group as CEO and COO, respectively. Vista owns a portfolio of hotels sprinkled across the U.S. and Canada, including the Marina Inn at Grande Dunes in Myrtle Beach, S.C., according to its website. The firm’s other investments include retirement communities, shopping centers and office space.

Wurzak owns three other hotels in Florida, including the Element Fort Lauderdale, the Renaissance Fort Lauderdale Cruise Port Hotel, and the Dalmar, also in Fort Lauderdale, according to the firm’s website. The rest of the group’s portfolio is spread across Pennsylvania and Virginia.

South Florida’s hotel market has experienced a flurry of activity in recent weeks. Members of the Busch beer family joined forces with Tom Assouline of Assouline Capital to buy the Red South Beach hotel for $33 million. Toronto-based Catalyst Capital Group bought the Lord Balfour hotel in Miami Beach for $39.3 million. And in a lawsuit between RH, the luxury furniture brand formerly known as Restoration Hardware, and its Miami Design District landlord, court documents revealed plans for a $100 million renovation and RH branding of the historic Savoy hotel in Miami Beach. The lawsuit was settled, but it remains unclear if the plans for the Savoy are still in play.

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