
A judge has approved private-equity fund manager Z Capital Partners' $21.6-million purchase of the Canyon Ranch Hotel & Spa in Miami Beach, which Lehman Brothers put into bankruptcy protection earlier this year, The Wall Street Journal reports.
Judge Shelley C. Chapman of U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan last week approved the sale, a deal that reportedly did not sit well with a group of Canyon Ranch condo owners who wanted to buy the property and had fought it in court.
However, Z Capital and another group of Canyon Ranch condo owners that already supported the deal reached a compromise with the disgruntled group that satisfied their objections, The Journal further reports.
“We are extremely pleased to have been approved by the bankruptcy court in the acquisition of the Carillon Hotel & Spa in Miami Beach,” James Zenni, president and chief executive of Z Capital, said in a Tuesday news release, referring to an alternate name for the Canyon Ranch property.
A deal to sell the 580-room property fell through earlier this year after the condo owners tied it up in court. Z Capital is buying the hotel lot, the retail lot and unsold condominium units. Debts amount to about $17 million, not including about $10 million in disputed litigation claims, court papers have said.