Carolina Beach Hotels Suites|"Blackstone In Talks To Buy Stake In Hotels Once Owned"

Source             :   irishtimes.com
Category         :   Carolina Beach Hotels Suites
By                   :   Former Berkley Court
Posted By      :   Hotels Carolina Beach NC

Carolina Beach Hotels Suites

Blackstone Group is in talks to buy a 25 per cent stake in three hotels once owned by now-bankrupt developer Sean Dunne in Ballsbridge, Dublin. The real estate, once Ireland’s most expensive, is being sold by the administrators of the UK unit of failed Icelandic lender Kaupthing Bank hf, two people with knowledge of the matter said. Kaupthing Singer and Friedlander Ltd.’s administrators, EY, declined to comment on the transaction. A spokesman for Blackstone, the biggest manager of private-equity real estate funds, also declined to comment.

Mr Dunne bought the former Berkeley Court, the Towers and Jurys Hotel in 2005 for about €380 million. At the time it was the highest price per acre paid for sites in Ireland. His banks, Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc’s Ulster Bank, Rabobank and Kaupthing, took control of the hotels in 2009 after planning authorities refused Dunne permission to redevelop the 6.8-acre site amid a real-estate market collapse. The UK Treasury put Kaupthing Singer and Friedlander into administration in the UK in 2008 as it went into default. Mr Dunne was declared bankrupt in Ireland’s High Court last month. Blackstone is among a wave of US investors, including Kennedy-Wilson Holdings and Oaktree Capital Group, to snap up Irish real-estate assets in the past two years. Blackstone, based in New York, bought the 501-bedroom Burlington Hotel in the same district in November for €67 million from Lloyds Banking Group. That’s less than a quarter of the €288 million an Irish real-estate developer Bernard McNamara paid for the property in 2007. McNamara was declared bankrupt in the UK last year.

Source:irishtimes.com/business/sectors/commercial-property/blackstone-in-talks-to-buy-stake-in-hotels-once-owned-by-dunne-1.1509702

Carolina Beach Hotels Suites|"Halal Hotels Lure Turks"

Source             :   hurriyetdailynews.com
Category         :   Carolina Beach Hotels Suites
By                   :   ISTANBUL
Posted By      :   Hotels Carolina Beach NC

Carolina Beach Hotels Suites

Alternative holidays in halal hotels in Turkey have been drawing the attention of Turkish people, rather than Arab tourists, according to sector professionals.Local tourists make up a major proportion of visitors who prefer alternative holidays, Seval Tur General Manager Ömer Solmaz said in a telephone interview with the Hürriyet Daily News yesterday. Solmaz said Turks living abroad were the second largest group choosing these hotels, while other Muslims in European countries and Russia were interested in alternative holidays despite their share in total visitor numbers in Turkey being relatively low.The hotels offer their visitors separate swimming pools and beaches for women and men, along with halal food and non-alcoholic drinks. 

Solmaz said people who generally want to have a holiday with their family in an alcohol-free environment prefer such Muslim-friendly hotels, particularly adding that women tend to feel “more comfortable” there. “Veiled women are able to wear swimsuits or bikinis while they swim in separate pools, or in the sea off separate beaches. In addition, some unveiled women prefer these hotels, in order to avoid being disturbed by the attitude of some men,” he said. A representative from Yörünge Turizm told the Daily News that Arab tourists generally preferred normal hotels in the southern provinces in summer. “This is because they are already living in conservative countries. When they come to Turkey, they’re looking for something different,” he said. The hotels serve at almost full capacity in the summer season, except during the month of Ramadan, when the capacity falls to around 50 percent. “The people who prefer alternative holidays are usually prayerful. They can’t swim while they’re fasting. That’s why the occupancy rates fall during Ramadan,” Solmaz said, adding that some hotels were lighting the beaches at nights for their Ramadan visitors, who sometimes wanted to swim after the fasting breaking iftar meal.he alternative holiday has been a rising trend over the last decade of Justice and Development Party (AKP) rule, according to sector players. While there are currently only around 50 hotels for alternative holidays in Turkey (approximately 30 halal hotels and 20 thermal hotels), it seems like their number will increase.

Muslim-friendly hotels are particularly located in the southern, Aegean, northwestern and Black Sea regions, while thermal hotels are generally in interior provinces.“Thermal hotels are for health tourism. They don’t have alcohol drinks for health reasons, but they have become a part of alternative holidays over time,” Seçim Aydın, the president of Anatolia Tourism Enterprises Association, told the Daily News. He also added that some places in plateaus in the Black Sea region had started to offer alternative holidays.“Alternative holidays are appropriate for Islamic tendencies,” Aydın said. “These hotels’ profit margins and occupancy rates are higher than the others. As long as this profitability continues, investments in this sector will continue under this government’s rule.” The prices per person, per night range between 25 euros and 220 euros in alternative holiday hotels.

Source:hurriyetdailynews.com/halal-hotels-lure-turks-not-arabs.aspx?pageID=238&nid=53422