News
THE COOL OLD BUILDINGS BRIGADE
February 28, 2012
| If there were an Oscar for best bargain hunters in a major metropolitian area, we'd nominate Gibraltar principals John Slonecker and Gerry Pigotti. (If Achievement in Sound Mixing can be a category, why not this?) |
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| Instead of running when the recession hit, they formed Perseus Capital Partners, raised $12M in private capital, and started snapping up distressed properties in and around downtown. Result: a unique portfolio embodying Seattle's artsy urban aesthetic. Turns out there were advantages to not flinching. "We could walk into distressed deals and make an offer," John tells us. "In turn, we got some pretty favorable deals." |
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| John and Gerry picked up the 83-year-old, 34k SF A.E. Doyle building (above) on clearance for $5.6M in 2010 (it sold in 2006 for $7.3M). A follow-up was the Belltown's Watermarke Apartments for $6.6M (compared to $9.6M the seller forked out in 2007). Last month, they closed on the Union Arms Manor Apartments, a 79-unit building on Capitol Hill. Part of the strategy has been to look for buildings that are uniquely Seattle—"older, cooler, and funky," as Gerry puts it. (That's also how people describe Jack Nicholson.) Their taste appeals to the new generation of office tenants, who seem more excited about working in these buildings than paying more to rent space in an office tower. As the market rebounds, John and Gerry are still looking to expand the hospitality area of the portfolio. "I could really see us headed to Portland or Vancouver," says John. |
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| In Fremont, we met up with hostel owner and operator Lee Kindell for a tour of the beautiful new Hotel Hotel hostel, opened last summer. Lee's association with John and Gerry began in 2009, when they purchased the former Lorraine Hotel in Belltown together and transformed it into City Hostel Seattle. (We think John and Gerry deserve Oscars, but City Hostel actually won one— it was just voted No. 1 US hostel in Hostelworld's 2012 "Hoscar" Awards.) Lee's vision, including giving over each of City Hostel's 51 rooms to local artists to decorate, morphed the former subsidized apartment building into what looks and feels like a boutique hotel. |
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| City Hostel has been such a success—"We were selling out every night last summer," John tells us—that the partners bought the Dubliner building on Fremont Avenue North the next year and transformed it into Hotel Hotel, bringing a bit of Soho to the center of the universe, John says. With its charcoal gray walls, elegant blue lighting, and quiet atmosphere, the 28-room hostel seems like an urban loft space. It's haute hosteling, and why not? Lee, snapped here reclining on a bed in one of the private rooms, is succinct about it: "We've raised the bar," he says. |
