Famous Glass Wall Dearborn Hyatt Regency to Be Sold, & Made into Apartments
It was literally a tourist attraction in itself. Once a shining landmark in Dearborn, Michigan, the Hyatt Regency Hotel was spectacular elegance complete with a monorail connecting the hotel to the adjacent Fairlane Town Center shopping mall. And then it fell apart.
The Dearborn Hyatt Regency hotel, which has been closed since December 2018, is now under contract to be sold to a New York-based company that is looking to transform the property into apartments. According to the Detroit Free Press, the 773-room hotel may be redeveloped into a mix of 375 market-rate apartments and possibly a small hotel by the new owners if the deal goes through.
The hotel, the second largest in the state next to the Renaissance Center in Detroit, was formerly owned by Edward Gong, a Chinese-born businessman who immigrated to Canada. Gong, who purchased the hotel in 2016 for $20 million, renaming it The Edward Hotel & Convention Center, had to relinquished control of the property after facing criminal charges in Canada for fraud and money-laundering allegations.
The once majestic hotel known for its glass walls was actually closed by the city of Dearborn in December of 2018 due to safety violations. The property is now owned by the U.S. and Canadian governments and the sale is pending through the U.S. Marshals Service, and could close in a matter of weeks according to the Detroit Free Press.
The selling price and the identity of the New York based buyer is unknown at this time, but the report notes it is a large company that owns more than 15,000 apartments. Marketing agent SImon Jonna of the Jonna Group, a division of Colliers International, told the Detroit Free Press,
“We had tremendous national and international interest," Jonna said. “We had a lot of prominent buyers that we were sorry to see go, but this buyer just stepped it up."
Hopefully new life will be given to the iconic building soon.
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