Blue Suede nabs $27M loan to update two Miami Beach hotels and apartment building

Blue Suede Hospitality Group landed a $27 million loan to refurbish two Miami Beach hotels and an apartment building undergoing renovations.

Franklin BSP Realty Trust, an affiliate of New York-based asset management firm Benefit Street Partners, provided the two-year mortgage secured by Kayak Miami Beach at 2216 Park Avenue, Blue Moon Hotel at 944 Collins Avenue, and the adjacent apartment building at 952 Collins Avenue, records show. 

“We are financing the properties with the new loan,” New York-based Blue Suede CEO Kenneth Lipschutz said via text. “We are underway on the renovations of the former Blue Moon and Kayak hotels, and will reopen post-renovation with new branding and food and beverage partners at each hotel in October of this year.”

Lipschutz said he could not disclose the new hotel brands and the new restaurants, but that announcements “will be forthcoming in the next couple of weeks.” 

Blue Suede acquired the two Art Deco hotels at a discount. In May, the firm paid $16.6 million for the 75-room Blue Moon, roughly $100,000 below the previous sale price in 2013 when seller Hersha Hospitality Trust paid $16.7 million for it, records show. 

Blue Suede plans to combine Blue Moon and the 22-unit building at 952 Collins Avenue, which the firm bought for $6.5 million in 2022, and convert the properties into a 97-key hotel, Lipschutz said. 

In April, Blue Suede acquired Kayak Miami Beach for $12.8 million, nearly $1 million below the previous sale price, from the seller, Minneapolis-based global alternative investment firm Varde Partners. A month earlier, Varde had paid $13.8 million for Kayak Miami Beach in a deed in lieu of a foreclosure deal. Blue Suede is betting big in South Beach. In February of last year, the firm also bought South Beach Plaza Hotel and South Beach Plaza Villas, both on 14th Street and Collins Avenue, for $26.5 million. Two months later, Franklin BSP provided a $10.5 million loan secured by the two buildings, which are also being renovated and are set to reopen as a single 79-room hotel in October.