Morgan Stanley Real Estate Funds (MSREF) has sold a portfolio of European hotels to Lebanese businessman Toufic Aboukhater for around EUR 450 mln, well-informed market sources confirmed to PropertyEU.
The transaction, which was first reported by Property Week, is expected to close in the next two weeks.
The hotels were acquired by Morgan Stanley at the top of the market for its MSREF VI fund, which had raised $8.8 bn in 2006. The fund bought the Danube portfolio including seven Intercontinental hotels for EUR 634 mln, using roughly EUR 450 mln in debt provided by Barclays Capital. The sale is now likely to be just enough to repay the bank's investment.
All parties declined to comment.
InterContinental has a 30-year management and branding contract on the properties, with the option to renew for as many as another 20 years. The portfolio includes Intercontinental hotels in Amsterdam, Vienna, Madrid, Rome, Frankfurt and Budapest as well as the famous 338-room Carlton hotel in Cannes. The assets range in size from 79 to 770 rooms.
Last year Morgan Stanley sold the 289-room Hilton hotel on Barcelona's Avenida Diagonal to Westmont Hospitality for around EUR 40 mln. The property was bought by Morgan Stanley in July 2007 together with seven other hotels for EUR 556 mln.
Morgan Stanley is also believed to be seeking a sale of the 70,000-m2 Trianon office tower in Frankfurt, which has a book value of just EUR 471 mln. The asset is being sold as part of the liquidation of the P2 Value Fund which holds a majority stake (57%) in the building while Morgan Stanley Eurozone Office Fund controls the remaining 43%.
Morgan Stanley Real Estate purchased the 186-metre tower at Mainzer Landstraße 16 from Germany's DekaBank in 2007 for EUR 620 mln.
Click on the link below to read: MSREF sells Berliner Bogen in Hamburg | 
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