The infamous Dana Point resort where American International Group (AIG) sponsored
a luxury retreat just days after accepting a federal bailout reportedly has a new owner.
]
Washington Holdings announced it has taken control of the St. Regis Monarch Beach resort and golf course in a transaction that had the Seattle real estate investment company valuing the property at about $235
million, reports the Los Angeles Times.
Hammered by the economic downturn, the five-star, 400-room
resort was headed for the auction block last summer after its previous owners defaulted on a $70-million loan
from Citigroup Global Markets Realty Group.
The St. Regis was also an accomplice in the creation of a phenomenon known as “the AIG effect,” which chilled corporate events and caused group bookings to plummet at swanky resorts around the country.
The AIG effect was blamed in February for the closure of the Ritz-Carlton Las Vegas.
California's only five-star, five-diamond coastal resort with a full
golf course will continue to be operated as a St. Regis by Starwood
Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc., the Times reports.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.