CIM Group Sells Oakland Marriott Hotel

By Keith Loria, Contributing Editor

The DiNapoli Group acquired the Oakland Marriott City Center, a 21-story, 489-key hotel in downtown Oakland, from CIM Group for a reported $84 million.

CIM’s acquisition of the Oakland Marriott in 2007 was the company’s first asset acquisition in downtown Oakland, and was part of the company’s approximately 3-million-square-foot Bay Area portfolio that includes a variety of Class A commercial properties in San Francisco and Oakland.

“CIM identifies communities in established and transitional urban markets with key attributes including a solid transportation infrastructure and a walkable environment,” Shaul Kuba, CIM Group’s co-founder & principal, told Commercial Property Executive. “This property located in downtown Oakland is close to the commercial core and a block from a BART stop allowing easy access to San Francisco.”

Located at 1001 Broadway, the hotel neighbors the Oakland Convention Center and is just one block from a BART station.

According to Kuba, CIM’s in-house teams develop or reposition properties to create stabilized cash flows that make these assets attractive to domestic and international investors.

The hotel went through a comprehensive renovation in 2011, including the modernization of all common areas and guest rooms. CIM, along with the City of Oakland, also renovated the hotel and Convention Center’s combined 89,000 square feet of meeting space.

Analysts feel the hospitality industry in Oakland should be on the rise thanks to a growing nightlife in the area.

“Generally speaking I think Oakland is underserved in ‘hospitality’ or ‘hotel’ and I think the reasons are obvious,” Ken Meyersieck, Colliers International’s senior vice president, San Francisco East Bay, told CPE. “If you were coming to the Bay Area for a short business trip where would you want to stay…Oakland or San Francisco?  That said, the organic growth in the restaurants, beer gardens, entertainment areas are all showing very positive signs and that momentum is reflected in multi-family rental rates. Couple that with the new construction that is on the horizon it will just be a matter of time before demand for overnight rooms will increase.”

So far in 2015 CIM has sold assets totaling 570 residential units, 908 hotel rooms and approximately 1,420,000 square feet of retail space.