Falor Cuts Deal With Hilton Heir

MIAMI BEACH-In a celebrity market where few transactions raise eyebrows anymore, Chicago hotelier Robert Falor and Nicky Hilton of the Hilton Hotel family are closing a deal that will rename two of Falor’s Miami Beach properties with a new “Nicky O, a Nicky Hilton Hotel” brand, South Florida sources confirm for GlobeSt.com. Falor and Hilton couldn’t reached by GlobeSt.com’s publication deadline.

The hotels to be renamed are the 95-room, 71-year-old Edison Hotel at 960 Ocean Dr. and the 64-room, 67-year-old Breakwater Hotel next door at 970 Ocean Dr. According to Miami Beach general contractors who have worked with Falor on his other properties, the hotelier is completing a two-year, $9-million renovation and reconfiguration of the two properties that are being transformed into one 113-suite condominium hotel. Hotel suites will be sold for about $500,000; penthouses for over $1 million, Miami Beach hotel marketing sources intimate with the project tell GlobeSt.com. Falor bought both hotels in September 2004 for $22 million, as GlobeSt.com previously reported.

The Falor-Hilton deal involves the 22-year-old sister of personality Paris Hilton licensing her name specifically to the Falor properties in South Beach and possibly completing similar deals for other Falor-owned properties across the country, real estate sources in a position to know tell GlobeSt.com. Nicky Hilton is best known for her “Chick” design line of clothes and handbags, according to fashion industry sources.