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Next Wednesday, the hotel within Trump International Hotel & Tower Chicago, which is still under construction on the Chicago River in the city’s downtown, will have its soft opening. In hospitality industry parlance, that means open for business, but before any elaborate grand opening ceremonies. The hotel will be the first operational part of the 92-story development on the former site of the Sun-Times building, with a total of 339 rooms, roughly half of which will be suites of various configurations, the other half studios.This morning CPN spoke with Jim Petrus, COO of Trump International Hotels L.L.C., in Chicago about…

The Ainbinder Co. has kicked off construction of a 550,000-square-foot mixed-use retail center in Plano, Texas. The project will be developed in phases, with the first retail tenant opening up shop this June. High Street at Stonebriar will occupy 35 acres about 30 minutes outside of Dallas. In addition to the retail offerings, the Class A lifestyle center will feature office space, as well as a boutique hotel. The Container Store has already committed to space and will be just one of a bevy of national retailers planned for the development. Ainbinder, relying on UCR Urban to oversee retail leasing…

For most equity real estate investment trusts, existing lines of bank credit and cash flow above dividend requirements will provide enough liquidity to meet short-term cash needs, according to a report released by New York City-based Fitch Ratings.The report, “Liquidity Focus: U.S. Equity REITs,” says that Fitch-rated equity REITs have drawn only 29.8 percent of funds available in bank lines of credit and cash left over after dividends. In addition, less than 20 percent of long-term debt owed by Fitch rated equity REITs will come due over the next 2 years. “Another important consideration is unencumbered assets — assets that…

Ashford Hospitality Trust Inc. and Prudential Real Estate Investors have created a joint venture to invest in and originate mezzanine debt secured by hotels, and buy equity hotel investments.  The JV, which will be funded over the next two years, will ultimately be capitalized to the tune of about $300 million, according to the partners. “Ashford got out of the lending business about 18 months ago, because spreads for mezzanine debt had compressed too much,” a spokesperson for Ashford told CPN this morning. “The compensation for the risk just wasn’t enough. But now spreads have widened, and it’s a good…

Daniel Corp. has just committed to acquiring HealthSouth Corp.’s headquarters campus in Birmingham, Ala., in a $43.5 million deal. Terms of the definitive agreement allow the health company to continue to occupy its 200,000-square-foot office building under a sale-leaseback arrangement. Financial terms of HealthSouth’s long-term lease with Daniel Corp. have not been disclosed; however, Class A office space in the city leases for about $21 per square foot, according to a fourth quarter 2007 report by corporate real estate service advisory firm CresaPartners. In addition to HealthSouth’s 13-year-old headquarters building, which occupies 85 acres, the transaction will include an adjoining…

CBRE Capital Markets has completed the sale and financing of a 29-building, 1.6 million-square-foot office portfolio located throughout suburban Pennsylvania for $184 million. The portfolio consists of low and mid-rise Class A and B office buildings located in the Horsham, Bucks, Lehigh Valley and Fort Washington submarkets of suburban Philadelphia. The properties range in size from 25,000 to 115,000 square feet. James Gunning and Donna Falzarano of CBRE New Jersey’s capital markets team arranged the $184 million in permanent first mortgage financing on behalf of buyer G&I VI Interchange Office L.L.C., a joint venture between a fund managed by DRA…

Raymond Torto, former principal & managing director of CB Richard Ellis Inc. subsidiary Torto Wheaton Research, has been named CBRE’s global chief economist. In this newly created position, he will direct the company’s worldwide team of commercial real estate market analysts and will speak on macro economic issues in the commercial real estate market. And with the announcement coming only a day after the Federal Reserve dropped the federal funds rate from 4.25 percent to 3.5 percent, Torto certainly has plenty of economic issues on his plate already. Torto (pictured) told CPN that yesterday’s events will only have a minimal…

Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. has just struck a deal with EST Capital to sell three of its hotels in the Italian markets of Venice Lido and Asolo for $229 million. Among the three properties involved in the transaction are Westin Excelsior and the Hotel Des Bains on the island of Venice Lido, as well as the Villa Cipriani in Asolo. Additionally the binding agreement encompasses an unspecified amount of office, retail, and storage space also in Asolo. “This transaction is part of a strategy already announced to operate an asset right portfolio of hotels with the right balance…

In the hot Houston market, Chase Merritt and joint venture partner Pacific Coast Capital Partners L.L.C. have taken its second asset in the region with the 424,000-square-foot mixed-use Four Corners in Houston for an undisclosed price. In November, the joint venture acquired West Loop I and II, two Class A office buildings totaling 314,000-square-feet, located in Houston’s Bellaire submarket. “Historically, Houston has been a strongly cyclical market, because of its ties to the energy industry,” Chad Horning, president & CEO of Chase Merritt, told CPN in November. “But more recently, that’s been mitigated by economic diversification, and the internationalization of…

The Federal Reserve slashed the federal funds rate by three quarters of a percentage point this morning, the largest single rate cut since October of 1984.  The move by the Fed to drop the rate from 4.25 percent to 3.5 percent came at an unscheduled meeting Tuesday, just over a week before the next scheduled meeting on Jan. 30. The Fed also lowered the discount rate, or the rate at which banks can borrow from the central bank, by three quarters of a point, to 4.0 percent.  Gary Gabriel, managing director of the capital markets group at Cushman & Wakefield…