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Dallas

Dunhill unloads Design District apartments tied to Bill Hutchinson’s civil suit

BV Capital picked up the property in a deal financed with a $39.5 million loan

Dunhill founder Bill Hutchinson and1900 Hi Line Drive (Highland Park Police Department, Google Maps)
Dunhill founder Bill Hutchinson and1900 Hi Line Drive (Highland Park Police Department, Google Maps)

Dunhill Partners just unloaded its third Design District property of 2022, with a sale to Dallas-based BV Capital.

BV Capital purchased the Dunhill Apartments in the city’s Design District, according to the Dallas Morning News. The purchase was financed with a $39.5 million loan, according to county records.

Dunhill has been selling properties since its founder Bill Hutchinson was charged with sexual assault in Texas and California, the newspaper reported.

Built in 2018, the 200-unit apartment complex at 1900 Hi Line Drive offers rental units ranging from $1,400 to $2,300 a month. Until now, the 4-acre property was owned by an investment partnership headed by Dallas’ Dunhill Partners. The company was behind much of the development and renovation of the Design District, including the Virgin Hotels Dallas, which was launched through a partnership between Hutchinson and Richard Branson.

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In the summer of 2021, Hutchinson was charged with sexually assaulting a teenage girl at his Laguna Beach home. The 63-year-old Dallas-area developer, once featured on the reality show, “Marrying Millions” with his then 23-year-old wife, is currently facing one count of rape of an unconscious person and five misdemeanor counts of nonconsensual touching in the state of California. About a month before the charges were filed, Hutchinson stepped down as president of Dunhill, saying it was a move he had been considering for several years. He also sold many of his personal properties, as well as his investment in Dallas’ Design District, according to DMN.

A few months later, Hutchinson would face a civil suit in Texas for sexual misconduct by a woman who alleges the two met while having drinks at his Dallas Virgin Hotel in the Design District and he sexually assaulted her. Hutchinson’s attorney Levi McCathern has called the allegations in the Texas suit, “total malarkey… solely to extract money from Bill Hutchinson.”

Representatives of Dunhill Apartments and Dunhill Partners didn’t return the Dallas paper’s requests for comment. Virgin Hotels spokeswoman Ana Lanzas said in a written statement the company takes the allegations “extremely seriously” and that Hutchinson was no longer involved in “any active capacity” with Virgin Hotels Dallas.

Since the allegations against Hutchinson came to light, the commercial real estate firm has been unloading its Design District properties. Two of those, the Dallas Decorative Center on Hi Line Drive and the Dallas Design Center on Stemmons Freeway, were sold in February to Dallas-based HN Capital and McCourt Partners of New York. The two properties, which Dunhill had owned since 2014, total more than 800,000 square feet of showroom, restaurant and retail space and house more than 100 tenants.

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LawsuitReal Estate Investment