Spanish fast-fashion mogul Amancio Ortega’s Ponte Gadea purchased a 205-key hotel at 70 Park Avenue for $67.6 million, according to city property records. The seller was hotel investment firm KHP Capital Partners.
The neoclassical-style Murray Hill hotel was built in 1928 and will now be operated by Spanish hotel company Grupo Iberostar. Seller KHP bought the 16-story building, which measures approximately 83,000 square feet, for $88.5 million in 2006, so the building’s value has dropped considerably over the last decade.
KHP was represented by Doug Hercher and Evan Hurd of hospitality brokerage Robert Douglas on today’s transaction.
Ortega, founder of the Inditex fashion company behind brands like Zara and Massimo Dutti, is the second richest man in the world, and has been buying up U.S. properties with gusto over the last several months through his real estate investment vehicle Ponte Gadea. In December, Ponte Gadea acquired a Soho office building at 490 Broadway for $145 million in Soho. And in September, the firm bought an entire block on Miami Beach in Florida for $370 million.
This is not Ortega’s first venture into the hotel business. In Miami, he invested in the 54-story Epic Residences & Hotel luxury project, which was completed in 2008.