Well, the day has arrived.
According to The Wall Street Journal, the Trump Organization has finally–finally!–reached an agreement to offload its failing Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C. for $375 million.
Pretty impressive, right?
Not quite. Trump initially wanted $500 million for the place. But after sitting on the market for roughly two years with no interested buyers, he had to drop the price by $100 million in January. Now, apparently, he’s had to drop it by another $25 million. And, despite reports that he wanted his name kept on front of the building, that’s being dropped, too.
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CGI Merchant Group has reportedly struck a deal with Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. to rebrand the hotel and scrub Trump’s name from the property. Once the deal has been finalized and the building has been saged and sanitized, the hotel will be managed by Hilton’s Waldorf Astoria group.
The sale is expected to be finalized sometime after the new year, according to the Journal.
?Trump Hotel, DC – Looks like they drained the swamp pic.twitter.com/dgDg3HxRbp
— Jane Mayer (@JaneMayerNYer) January 27, 2021
Trump is no doubt relieved to finally be unloading the property, even though he doesn’t appear to be getting much of anything he wanted out of the deal.
Despite opening to much pomp and circumstance in 2016, documents released by the House Oversight and Reform Committee last month show that it hemorrhaged more than $70 million between 2017 and 2020, even though he lied and said it was making millions and millions and millions of dollars.
Per CNN:
Trump’s income from the Trump International Hotel reported in public financial disclosures dating from 2016 to 2020 totaled more than $156 million, the committee said Friday.
But in that four-year period, Trump’s DC hotel actually suffered a net loss of more than $70 million while he was president and had to be loaned more than $27 million from one of Trump’s holding companies, DJT Holdings LLC, from 2017 to 2020, according to hotel financial statements the committee obtained.
News of the hotel’s impending sale comes shortly after Trump was kicked off Forbes’ list of the 400 richest people in America, a coveted group he’s belonged to for more than two decades.
It also comes shortly after reports that Trump International Hotel & Tower Vancouver, which closed last year after declaring bankruptcy, is now under new management and being rebranded, which means his name is being removed from that building too.
Little by little, skylines across North America are being scrubbed of the Trump family stain.
Graham Gremore is the Features Editor and a Staff Writer at Queerty. Follow him on Twitter @grahamgremore.
Jim
“Trump was kicked off Forbes’ list of the 400 richest people in America,”!!
Why did it take so long for Forbes to realize that Trump lies about his finances.
Don’t think I’d trust such a news source that is soooo clueless.
Mr. Stadnick
The Hilton company should re-brand the hotel as the Hillary Clinton just to watch trump have apoplexy.
Thad
Or “The Ivana”?
Thad
FWIW, the large prominent Trump hotels in Las Vegas, Chicago, and Honolulu are still there, get good reviews, and appear profitable. I’d never stay there; they aren’t good value, but some people feel otherwise.
BoomerMyles
But he lost his properties in NYC (Soho) and Toronto.
Word in the hotel industry his properties in Chicago, Las Vegas and Waikiki are floundering too.
Cam
So let’s see, you say…… “I’d never stay there, BUT…….. They’re affordable, and have great reviews and are profitable”.
Subtle.
AZ71
I hope they call it “The Brandon”
M K
Remember…. Many if the properties with his name are only a licensing deal… where he is paid for the use and he has no hand in its operation and ownership.
Cam
The amount of mortgages he has on the properties are also a reason he fell off the Forbes list. Yeah, he got 375 million for the lease of the DC hotel, but he spent around 200 million in buying the lease and renovations, and then lost the 70 million, plus the interest on the debt because he has made no payments on it…..
Not looking good.