Question of the Day - 25 January 2018

That’s correct. Across Tropicana Avenue from In-N-Out Burger on Dean Martin Drive, where the demolished and forgotten Golden Palm non-casino-hotel stood just west of the Tropicana Avenue and Interstate 15 interchange, hotel developer Gary Tharaldson is building a five-story 113-room TownePlace Suites and a five-story 135-room Home2 Suites.

Tharaldson, according to a story in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, is the richest person in his home state of North Dakota, with a net worth of $1 billion. He’s owned upwards of 350 hotels nationwide and been involved in a number of Las Vegas deals, including flipping the old Westward Ho acreage for a $100 million profit in 2006. He also built and sold four small non-gaming hotels at Russell Road and I-15 — Staybridge Suites, Fairfield Inn, Holiday Inn Express, and Residence Inn.

More recently, he built and opened another four-story 131-room Residence Inn on Las Vegas Boulevard South just south of E. Warm Springs Road, along with a six-story 169-room Hilton Garden Inn and a six-story 157-room Homewood Suites on Dean Martin Drive near Harmon Avenue, just south of Panorama Towers.

As for the three-acre Tropicana property, Tharaldson is leasing it from owner Marvin Lipschultz. Lipschultz closed the Golden Palm in 2007, at a time when the property was appraised at nearly $50 million, just under $16 million an acre, though the property was never sold and the Golden Palm never reopened. That year, a 41-story resort, to be called One Trop, was announced for the property, but never left the launching pad.

The two new non-casino hotels being built there now, scheduled to open in the next few months, are targeted at business travelers and frequent Las Vegas visitors who don’t want to be on the Strip, but do want to be within walking distance or quick striking distance by cab or Lyft, as well as only a short walk to the Las Vegas Raiders Stadium when it opens in a couple of years.