El-Ad Completes $260M Plaza Hotel Refi

NEW YORK CITY-El-Ad Group and Kingdom Holding, owners of the Plaza Hotel here, have completed a $260 million refinancing of the hotel portion of the fully restored 1907 landmark. The financing will be used to convert the hotel’s construction loan into a long-term, permanent mortgage for the hotel.

The financing was provided by a consortium of banks headed by HSBC Bank USA, and includes a $40 million mezzanine loan provided by Transwestern Realty Finance Partners LLC. “We obviously faced strong head winds in this most challenging credit market of our times,” says Miki Naftali, president and CEO of locally based El-Ad, in a prepared statement, “but the strength of El-Ad, the quality of the hotel, the success of the operation and the power of the Plaza brand prevailed.”

The Plaza has 282 rooms and suites, including 152 hotel condominiums and 130 hotel rooms. The hotel is part of the nearly one-million-sf landmark purchased by El-Ad in 2004 for $675 million, as GlobeSt.com reported, from a partnership of Millennium & Copthorne Hotels Plc and Kingdom Investments. Millennium & Copthorne had purchased the Plaza in 1995 for $325 million. The restoration cost more than $400 million.