Loews Buys Boston’s 225-Room Back Bay Hotel for $84M

By Barbra Murray, Contributing Editor

Continuing its mission to expand its presence in gateway cities and leading resort markets over the next five years, Loews Hotels & Resorts has acquired The Back Bay Hotel, an iconic 225-room lodging property in Boston. Loews purchased the asset from Dublin-based The Doyle Collection for, according to Suffolk County records, nearly $84.4 million.

”Boston is one of (Loews president and CEO) Paul Whetsell’s main target cities, as it is an important destination and key market,” a spokesman for Loews told Commercial Property Executive.

The luxury hotel is a hot ticket. Even before Doyle decided to tap commercial real estate services firm CBRE Group Inc. to market the asset, the Irish hotel group had received more than a few unsolicited offers of interest from investors. It’s a one-of-a-kind property in a booming town.

And Back Bay Hotel has quite a history–old and new. The nine-story building at 350 Stuart St. made its debut in the 1920s as the headquarters of the Boston Police Department and served as such until the late 1990s, after which point Doyle, then known as Jurys Doyle Hotel Group, converted the property and re-opened its doors as the Jurys Boston Hotel in 2004. It became Back Bay Hotel following a rebranding campaign in 2009.

Now, under Loews’ stewardship, the hotel will get another makeover. The company has already changed the property’s flag to a Loews Hotels brand, and plans to invest approximately $8 million in a renovation project that will commence this fall.

Loews has been busy moving forward with its expansion program, which includes key resort markets.  In January, the company broke ground on Universal’s Cabana Bay Beach Resort  in Orlando and announced plans for the 400-room Loews Chicago Hotel. Additionally, Loews recently acquired the 356-room Madison Hotel in Washington, D.C.

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