French real estate group Covivio Hotels is reportedly planning to buy "a portfolio of European luxury hotels" from American private equity group Varde for an estimated €500 million to €600 million, according to Reuters. The deal could be finalized by the end of the year.
Two years ago, Varde acquired a collection of nine hotels from Italian group Boscolo, including the Grand Hotel dei Dogi in Venice and Palazzo Naiadi in Rome. The Reuters story did not specify which hotels would be included in the properties Covivio is eyeing.
Alexei Dal Pastro, CEO of Covivio's Italian operations, reportedly said at a recent conference that the company was "interested" in investing in Italian hospitality assets, but did specify which hotels had piqued the company's interest.
According to CBRE, hotel-investment volumes in Italy increased “substantially” in Q3, up 72.9 percent year over year to €2.56 billion. The Belmond Ltd. hotel company sale and the acquisition of a 15-hotel portfolio by Oaktree in Q2 helped boost Italy into the third most-invested-in European hotel market. This, in turn, was up from Q2, when Italy was the region's fourth most-invested-in market.