David Marx’s newly opened Hudson Yards hotel, heavily reliant on conference-goers flocking to the nearby Javits Convention Center, found itself nearly vacant when the coronavirus epidemic hit. But with Javits now reinvented as a medical surge facility, the hotel is hopping.
The National Guard has rented about 120 rooms at the hotel for staff now at Javits for a renewable two-week period at $262 per room, per night, according to an earnings report published by Marx’s Marx Development Group on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange Friday.
New York City’s Department of Health, meanwhile, has rented about 60 rooms until May 10 at the same daily rate for its staff working at the center.
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Two weeks ago, Marx Development Group disclosed that occupancy at its Hudson Yards venue, a Courtyard by Marriott at 461 West 34th Street, had fallen to about 10 percent as social distancing triggered a wave of cancellations and a drop in new bookings.
Now, the National Guard and Department of Health alone have boosted the 399-room hotel’s occupancy rate to at least 45 percent.
The hotel, which opened in November, is doing better now than it was three months ago: It had an occupancy rate of just 29 percent and an average daily rate of $252 at the end of last year, according to a CBRE appraisal.
Marx did not immediately respond to a request for comment. According to the disclosure, his company also intends to file a claim with its business-interruption insurance carrier once it can evaluate the full extent of damages caused by the pandemic.
Other New York hotels, such as the Four Seasons on East 57th Street, have offered free rooms to medical personnel as they help handle the explosion of coronavirus patients at city hospitals.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Thursday that the Javits medical facility would begin admitting Covid-positive patients, and not only non-Covid patients as originally planned. Today he said only patients with Covid-19 would be sent there, as fewer non-Covid patients than expected have been arriving at hospitals.