Sunshine Suites and Westin sold to Japanese investors
The Westin, Grand Cayman
(CNS): Two of Grand Cayman’s leading hotels have been sold to a Japanese investment company for more than $340 million. Invincible Investment Corporation has bought the 343-room Westin resort on Seven Mile Beach, which caters to the high-end tourism market, and the more budget line, but very popular, Sunshine Suites across the street. Pyramid Hotel Group, which currently manages the hotels, has reportedly been retained by the Japanese firm to keep running the two properties, which are turning a healthy profit, according to an announcement about the acquisition from Invincible.
A renovation of the Westin was recently completed, in which all the rooms and suites were updated and the hotel was reshaped, including floor-to-ceiling glass windows in the lobby that offer a fantastic view of Seven Mile Beach from the entrance.
The buyer stated on their website that the hotels offer further growth opportunities based on these recent renovations, as well as the growth in tourism in Cayman and the airport expansion project.
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Category: Local News
Westin caters to the high-end market? Well the “high-end” do a very good job of passing themselves off as fly-over state middle-management.
Being a snob and living in Cayman at the same time…
Snob? Just pointing out that Bill and Mandy from Biutte-Fouque, Indiana are never “high-end”.
Smell competition…fear is in the air for them boys…they know who!!
Under Kirk Tibbetts, Dart already acquired the 220-acre master-lease to 17A262 and 17A5 (originally Safehaven Ltd) via Dragon Bay Freehold Ltd. under the preferential terms outlined in the NRA Agreement. Literally acquiring the sub-leased rug from underneath the existing residential tenants (both Caymanian and non-Caymanian). They also occupy the Ritz sub-lease to the south. The Westin, The Falls Plaza, Sunshine Suites, Villas of the Galleon and Ritz are all part of different Crown lease grouping. In 2015, the 7.83 acre portion of the Westin was extended out to 2114 (96 more years) for $13.4mln, the rest is probably in the last critical 50 years of lease life where equity drops progressively and logarithmically to nil at expiry, unless the lease is successfully renegotiated. In the final 30 years of lease life, it becomes a very critical situation as no reasonable lender will want to finance what becomes a worthless asset at the end of the term…Lime Tree Bay must find themselves in that situation now with their lease ending April 2049 (31 years left).
https://cnsbusiness.com/2015/12/hotel-lease-extension-nets-13-4m-for-public-purse/
so people dont own the properties they bought? or just dont have the rights to decide what happens to them after the lease runs out?
People may own units in buildings that were constructed atop land that is leased from the crown or another head lease holder (for example, Dragon Bay Freehold Ltd), under certain rules and obligations, for a specific term. At the expiry date of the lease, the right to occupy that building or land becomes questionable – maybe it’s renewable, maybe not – but that discussion should be well-underway before the final 30 years of lease life where mortgage-ability ceases. In the UK, where the leasehold construct is very common, there are rules, rights, and obligations on both sides that don’t yet exist in law or practice in the Cayman Islands. The specific rules will be spelled-out in the head-lease and sub-lease documents.
I wonder if this means Caymanians will now stop getting kicked out???
We’re they kicked out for good behavior?
Being too brown skin bobo
Nonsense.
That is not true. My family and I have done staycations at the Westin several times. What I DID see were people that were kicked out of the pool because they weren’t guests. That seems fine to me; it’s not a public pool, but for guests.
私はこれを信じるカント
Watashi wa kore o shinjiru kanto!
What do you not believe?
あなたは何を信じません
Anata wa nani o shinjimasen
Donde estas mi shancleta?
How much for one night?
….Asked the awkward old drunk man at the bar who has about 5 kids, half starving, other half flaunting like they rich, similar to the dad.
Because things would just be so horrible if Dart owned it??? Not……
Please…I get it , people don’t want Dart owning any more tha he does….but,…….if he did buy these, so what. Would it be so horrible ????….I think not. I prefer it to be owned by someone who will do something great with it. And the surrounding properties.
Don’t get me wrong. He owns enough already….I get it…but. The lesser of two evils maybe. We know who Dart is and can figure his intentions based on the recent past. What can we figure these companies from Japan are going to do…
HAHAHAHA You have NO idea who Dart is!! Or you would have never allowed his buying monopoly of your ENTIRE 7 mile beach!!!
Makes me sad to sit back and say ‘I told you so’…
The creator of one of the planet’s biggest toxic trash problems repainted as a philanthropist developer? You must be new here. The Billionaire’s neglected waterlines are regularly cleaned by eager volunteers from “Plastic-Free Cayman”, while the DART employees clasp their hands in silence. Clearly you have had no direct interaction with the directionless DECCO and/or DRCL arms of the hydra. Most of their sneakily acquired holdings are sitting unmaintained, land-banked for later, when the Cayman Islands gov’t finally has to face the true financial position of their creation, then they will write the rescue and/or debt-trap terms. China is in the same neocolonialism racket.
no news here…its just a bunch of investors buying out the previous bunch….happens all the time.
Damn right. No way in hell we want those properties to end up in the hands of a Caymanian.
Praise the lord that it wasn’t Dart!
At least we know what Dart is about,
Do we??
1. No you don’t.
2. You think you know what he is about and you still approve?
3. See # 1
Don’t kid yourself.