The client, an institutional investor, is the owner of a leased, 4 star business hotel in a European city. The operating company could not adhere to their lease payments and an insolvency procedure had already opened at the time of our commissioning. Therefore, the owner quickly needed an alternative hotel company as a succession tenant.
The collective goal was to find a well-known, qualified and dependable operator at short notice with a strong credit standing in the midst of a recession phase who was additionally prepared to commit to the location with a long-term lease.
First, HOTOUR conducted an onsite review, spoke with the management of the present operator and carried out a basic inquiry for the location and accommodation market. Within a few days of the commissioning by the client, the selection of potential operators followed who were then approached with a detailed plan and a term sheet with the targeted lease terms.
On the basis of the submitted lease offers, a preselection of possible operators was made. After the selection of a preferred partner by the owner, HOTOUR accompanied the negotiation of the fundamental content of the contract that had already been established in a relatively detailed provisional agreement during the exclusivity phase. During the final contract negotiations, HOTOUR advised the client in cooperation with their solicitors in all questions relevant to the hotel and moderated the negotiation process with the new operator. Additionally, before the conveyance to the new hotel operator, the complete compilation of an inventory and documentation of the FF&E at the hotel was conducted by HOTOUR along with the coordination of a problem-free handing over of the hotel.
The client was able to sign a long-term lease with a well-known operating company within 6 months. The risky compromise from the investor’s view that minimised the operator’s risk during the first 4 years due to high variable lease shares turned out to be a success factor in the end: The operator succeeded in a difficult economic atmosphere and soon after the takeover, delivered higher variable lease payments to the investor than had been forecasted.