{"id":4098,"date":"2010-07-19T14:11:34","date_gmt":"2010-07-19T22:11:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=4098"},"modified":"2010-07-19T15:08:05","modified_gmt":"2010-07-19T23:08:05","slug":"next-victim-westin-casuarina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/next-victim-westin-casuarina\/","title":{"rendered":"Next victim: Westin Casuarina?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Here’s a story that seems to have slipped past all of us. On March 31, the Westin Casuarina<\/strong> was placed on “Imminent Default” status by Fitch Ratings<\/strong>. The property was running at 61.5% occupany, with ADRs of $119 and 61.55 respectively, as of a year ago. Other Las Vegas Strip hotels have done far, far worse but they’re usually not laboring under the overweight jockey that is owner Columbia Sussex<\/strong>‘s portfolio of expiring loans. Part of the reason ColSux is trying to spin 14 hotels off to Clearwater Hotel Trust<\/strong> is that it had a $215 million loan due July 1, and a $1.1. billion one that comes due on Oct. 12 and has run out of extensions.<\/p>\n

The latter was undertaken to finance a 14-hotel Wyndham<\/strong> acquisition during the easy-credit years of 2005-07. During ColSux’s stewardship, occupancy fell from 76% to 60%. The company’s financial position buckled further after it blithely ran up another $2.8 billion in debt to purchase Aztar Corp<\/strong>. (a transaction that was an express train to bankruptcy court).<\/p>\n

\"\"While the Westin Casuarina teeters near default, ColSux is playing out the string at the Horizon<\/strong> casino-hotel, up in the dwindling Lake Tahoe<\/strong> market. The Horizon’s lease expires March 31, 2011 and landlord Park Cattle Co<\/strong>. has shown every intention of giving ColSux the heave-ho and making the Horizon a casino-less property. The tenants have a tough row to hoe anyway, as reorganized Tropicana Entertainment<\/strong> stripped away much of the Horizon’s game inventory on the way out the door … the better to ramp up Montbleu<\/strong>, the former Caesars Tahoe<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

This aggregation of ColSux data is the work of frequent William J. Yung III<\/strong> nemesis Unite-Here<\/strong>, so one must carefully sift the data to keep it in context. It also casts some doubt on the viability of Clearview, whose CEO, Jon D. Kline<\/strong>, left previous employer Sunstone Hotel Investors<\/strong> in a state of dilution and ruination.<\/p>\n

In any event<\/strong>, this latest chapter in the rise and fall of Columbia Sussex as a casino power is yet another cautionary tale of companies so high on the crack cocaine that was ready credit they rang upon debt upon debt with too little thought given to the day of reckoning. The blue-sky scenarios that led to the crash and burn of the casino industry must look trippin’ in retrospect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here’s a story that seems to have slipped past all of us. On March 31, the Westin Casuarina was placed on “Imminent Default” status by Fitch Ratings. The property was running at 61.5% occupany, with ADRs of $119 and 61.55 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,14,7,76,9,19,21,38],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4098"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4098"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4107,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4098\/revisions\/4107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}