McGrath Properties gains approval for Napa Valley hospitality, housing project

200-unit hotel and 30 residences planned in American Canyon

McGrath Properties' Terrence McGrath with Watson Ranch
McGrath Properties' Terrence McGrath with Watson Ranch (McGrath Properties, Dahlin Group, Getty)

Oakland-based McGrath Properties is developing a 200-unit hotel and 30 residential units in Napa Valley, according to plans filed with American Canyon. The city’s Planning Commission gave the developer the go-ahead at their last meeting.

The hospitality and residential project will be built on a 20-acre site in the Watson Ranch enclave. Plans call for a three-story hotel that totals 173,000 square feet.

The residential units will range from 2,065 square feet to 2,650 square feet. There will be 15 buildings each housing two units. There will be a mix of 18 flare-style homes and 12 townhomes.

“I wanted these private residences to have connectivity to the hotel,” Terrence McGrath, founder of McGrath Properties, told the Planning Commision at the meeting. “But I also wanted them to be spatially far enough away where they didn’t encroach on the hotel and the hotel didn’t encroach on the private residences.”

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The hotel and residential units are part of The Watson Specific Plan, which was approved in 2018. The plan calls for building 1,200 new residential units and redeveloping an old cement factory into a new town center in Watson Ranch.

Wine Country’s hospitality market has gained traction so far this year. Maryland-based Weller Development Partners purchased the site of a planned 3,000-acre resort in Pope Valley. Plans include 70 guest cottages in a resort village and 18 glamping sites. Irvine-based Stratus Development Partners has listed two hotels in Napa and Sonoma for sale a few years after they were built.

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