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Hilton targets first quarter reopening for shuttered San Jose hotel
Company aims to reopen hotel long known as Fairmont San Jose under its Signia brand as soon as next month
Hilton aims to reopen the 805-room hotel long known as the Fairmont San Jose as soon as next month, according to its website, almost a year after its owner closed its doors and filed for bankruptcy.
The hospitality company is looking to hire a culinary team of up to about 45 people and multiple directors and managers for the hotel’s human resources, food and beverage, and property operations departments, among other open positions on its site. It intends to reopen the downtown hotel in February or March under the Signia by Hilton brand, the second hotel to fly that flag worldwide following one in Orlando, job descriptions say. The Mercury News earlier reported Hilton’s reopening plans.
An affiliate of BrightSpire Capital, the property’s principal lender, provided the hotel’s owner with a $185 million loan to bolster its financing, the Mercury News said. The loan, which hadn’t previously been reported, was recorded with the Santa Clara County Clerk-Recorder’s Office in November 2020. Signia previously agreed to invest $15 million into the hotel’s operations and finances, and JPMorgan Chase is loaning its owner, a group led by Bay Area-based real estate investor Sam Hirbod, an additional $25 million, the Mercury News reported.
Located at 170 South Market Street, the hotel operated for more than 30 years as the Fairmont San Jose and was previously run by Accor Management U.S. The Hirbod-led group closed its doors and filed for bankruptcy last March, citing economic challenges from the pandemic. Soon after filing for bankruptcy, the group terminated its contract with Accor to allow Signia to become the hotel’s new operator and manager, the Mercury News said.
A bankruptcy judge said last June that Accor may have suffered more than $22 million in damages due to the termination of its management agreement, leading the company and the hotel’s ownership to settle their dispute out of court. A federal judge approved a plan to reorganize the property’s finances in August, ending its bankruptcy proceedings and clearing the path toward a reopening.
[The Mercury News] — Matthew Niksa