"All Apple REIT buys are select service Hiltons and Marriotts," explains Thompson, who has worked with both buyer and seller on numerous transactions over the past 15 years. The hotel brokerage firm currently has approximately 60 hotels totaling $650 million on the market, with a handful of deals pending with Apple. Thompson says the recently sold portfolio was attractive to the Richmond, VA-based REIT because "each of the properties was along eastern seaboard states—geographically in the states Apple likes to invest in."

The $1 billion REIT sought hotels throughout the country, Sam Reynolds, vice president of acquisitions for Apple REIT, tells GlobeSt.com. "The cap rates and returns [on these properties] were better than expected in very good markets," he says of the acquisition, which involves properties in six states. Many of the sales within the portfolio were finalized over the last year, he says, while the last closing, involving the 143-room Hilton Garden Inn in Columbia, SC, took place just a few weeks ago for $21.2 million.

The remaining properties within the acquired portfolio include a 125-room Courtyard by Marriott in Harrisonburg, VA that sold for $23.2 million; a 131-room Hampton Inn in Bowling Green, KY that sold for $18.8 million; a 162-room Courtyard by Marriott in Somerset, NJ that sold for $16 million; a 106-room Hampton Inn in Port Wentworth, GA that sold for $10.7 million; a 101-room Hampton Inn located in Concord, NC sold for $9.2 million; and an 82- room SpringHill Suites in Greensboro, NC that sold for $8 million.