FORMERLY PE OWNED
La Quinta
Includes La Quinta Inn, LaQuinta
mid-scale hotel · Irving, TX
- PE Firm
- Blackstone →
- Year Acquired
- 2006
Blackstone put in $475 million, borrowed $3 billion, and still cashed out.
What Happened
- Blackstone acquired La Quinta in 2006 for $3.4 billion, investing just $475 million of equity and loading $3+ billion in debt
- Had to restructure $3.05 billion in debt after the 2008 recession, negotiating a $2.65 billion extension
- Converted 128 non-La Quinta hotels to the brand and pushed aggressively into franchising — franchised hotels grew from 158 to 466 under Blackstone ownership
- Took La Quinta public in April 2014, the start of Blackstone's exit. The public company later sold its franchise business to Wyndham in 2018 for $1.95 billion and spun the real estate into a separate REIT, CorePoint Lodging
The Damage Done
- 128 hotels from rival chains got rebranded as La Quinta, so the sign out front no longer guaranteed the same room inside
- The chain that once stood alone became a subsidiary of Wyndham, lumped in with other budget brands under a hotel conglomerate's umbrella
Sources
- Wyndham Buys La Quinta for $1.95B — Fortune(2018-01-18)
- Blackstone Completes La Quinta Acquisition — Blackstone(2006-01-25)
- La Quinta Holdings Form S-1 — SEC EDGAR(2014-02-07)
- Blackstone Restructures La Quinta Debt (reporting WSJ) — HOTELS Magazine(2012-05-22)
- Blackstone Takes La Quinta Public — Hospitality ON(2014-04-09)
- La Quinta Completes CorePoint Lodging Spin-Off — LODGING Magazine(2018-06-01)