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A wholly-owned unit of Ascott Residence Trust has completed the acquisition of a 224-unit hotel at 341 West 36th Street, New York for US$106 million (S$148.4 million), revealed an SGX filing on Thursday (17 August).
Known as DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel New York – Times Square South, the freehold property at Midtown Manhattan is close to many popular attractions like Times Square, the Empire State Building, Madison Square Garden and the Jacob Javits Convention Center. It is also near Penn Station, North America’s busiest train station that is used by more than 200 million passengers annually.
Apart from offering a range of stylish rooms, its facilities include a 24-hour fitness centre, meeting rooms, a business centre, a restaurant and bar.
The acquisition was financed by a loan from the New York branch of the Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation. Among the terms of the credit agreement signed on 16 August by Ascott’s subsidiary Barrydale SM LLC is that the trust must be solely managed by Ascott Residence Trust Management Limited. If there is a breach on this contract or there’s a default, it may trigger cross defaults of one or more other borrowings of Ascott REIT and/or its units and this may affect a total of S$1.53 billion in loans. Nevertheless, there has been no violation in the agreement as of 17 August.
The transaction was originally announced on 31 May 2017. Back then Ascott revealed that it will own a total of three properties in Manhattan with 1,004 units, upon completion of the purchase of DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel New York.
This article was edited by Denise Djong.
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