The hotel investment landscape is experiencing unprecedented dislocation, creating unique opportunities for savvy commercial real estate investors. In a recent episode of Peachtree Point of View, Greg Friedman sat down with Bennett Webster, Principal and Founder of Alchemy Real Estate Advisors, to explore how hotel investment strategies are evolving in this turbulent market environment.
Current Hotel Investment Market: Distress Creates Opportunity
Today's hotel investment market is characterized by significant distress, but this dislocation is creating unprecedented opportunities. Webster's firm has closed 21 transactions in under a year, with another 19 under contract—demonstrating the active nature of the distressed hotel investment sector. "There's no shortage of ample opportunity out there," Webster notes, citing everything from note sales in Manhattan to receiver sales in Seattle.
The distress isn't limited to traditional foreclosures. Many hotel investment owners are facing mandatory exits due to brand renovation requirements, capital partner pressures, or late-cycle investment timelines,creating a robust pipeline of motivated sellers.
Hotel Investment Transaction Trends: Follow the Smart Money
Market data reveals compelling hotel investment trends:roughly 50% of hotel transaction volume in the first half of 2024 involved properties under $50 million, with most deals likely under $25 million. These smaller hotel investment opportunities maintain strong liquidity and price integrity, often selling at negative leverage to regional buyers focused on operational value creation.
Interestingly, previously distressed markets are attracting renewed hotel investment interest. As Webster observes, "I've seen more bullish activity, more bullish sentiment on San Francisco in the past couple of weeks than we have in past couple of years." This shift suggests that patient hotel investment capital is beginning to identify bottom-fishing opportunities in formerly challenged markets.
Strategic Hotel Investment Approaches
Successful hotel investment in today's market requires a refined approach. Webster recommends three key hotel investment strategies:
Diversification drives hotel investment success. Target markets where you have operational scale and established lender relationships. Rather than concentrating capital in a single trophy asset,multiple smaller hotel investment opportunities can provide superior risk-adjusted returns.
Creative financing enhances hotel investment returns. With traditional financing constrained, successful hotel investment buyers are leveraging CMBS loan assumptions, negotiating interest-only periods during stabilization, and structuring deals that address both buyer and seller liquidity requirements.
Long-term thinking maximizes hotel investment value. As Webster emphasizes, "Capital structure is temporary, but purchase price is permanent." For committed hotel investment professionals with operational capacity, current pricing dislocation presents generational buying opportunities—despite temporarily elevated financing costs.
Hotel Investment Catalysts: The Renovation Factor
A critical catalyst driving current hotel investment opportunities is deferred maintenance and brand-mandated renovations. Many hotel investment owners who delayed capital improvements during COVID are now facing ultimatums from hotel brands: renovate or lose the flag. This dynamic creates forced selling situations that benefit well-capitalized hotel investment buyers ready to commit the necessary capital for property improvements.
The current hotel investment environment strongly favors patient, well-capitalized investors who can move decisively when opportunities arise. For those positioned to execute, today's dislocated hotel investment market offers compelling entry points that may not exist once capital markets normalize and competition intensifies.
Ready to explore advanced hotel investment strategies and market insights? Listen to the full Peachtree Point of View podcast episode featuring Bennett Webster's complete analysis of today's hotel investment opportunities and market dynamics.
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Institutional Real Estate – In an era where stubborn inflation keeps central bankers awake at night and rate volatility tests investor discipline, smart capital is quietly gravitating to assets that can flex, literally overnight. Hotels, with their daily lease resets, are one of the few real estate plays with a built-in inflation defense. But not all hotels are created equal. For investors looking to put capital to work today, premium-branded select-service and compact full-service hotels stand out as some of the most reliable performers across economic cycles, including inflationary periods.
Short Leases, Big Advantage
Unlike offices or retail, where lease terms can lock in rates for years, hotels are designed to be nimble. Operators adjust room rates daily, matching market demand and passing through cost increases with far less lag than other real estate types. During the inflationary surges of the 1970s and early 1980s, room rates in the United States climbed almost in lockstep with the Consumer Price Index. More recently, ADRs rose rapidly during the inflation spike of 2021–2023, especially in well-positioned premium brands. Yet flexibility alone is not enough. Demand elasticity still matters. Not every guest will pay more just because costs are higher. This is where premium select-service and compact full-service assets show their edge.
Why This Segment Holds Up
Hotels at the upper end of the select-service spectrum, including Marriott’s Courtyard and AC Hotels, Hilton’s Hampton Inn and Hilton Garden Inn, and IHG’s Hotel Indigo and Crowne Plaza, strike the balance travelers want: elevated comfort and amenities without full-service prices. They cater to travelers who want quality and consistency without paying for frills they do not use. Business travelers, sports teams and mid-tier corporate groups typically make up the core customer base. This gives owners both repeatability and rate integrity. Compact full-service properties, especially those under strong flags in good urban or suburban nodes, also shine here. They deliver enough amenities, such as an on-site restaurant, meeting space and a bar, to justify a healthy rate premium while keeping operating costs leaner than those of sprawling resorts or luxury assets.
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ATLANTA (Oct. 15, 2025) – Peachtree Group (“Peachtree”), a leading commercial real estate investment firm overseeing a diversified portfolio of more than $8 billion, today announced the appointment of Lindsay Monge as executive vice president of asset management. In this role, Monge will oversee the firm’s hospitality and real estate assets, driving performance, strategic planning and value creation across the portfolio.
Monge brings more than two decades of leadership experience in hospitality, real estate investment and operations to Peachtree. Most recently, he served as president of Seaview Investors where he led asset management and daily operations for a portfolio of eight Marriott and Hilton-branded upscale hotels in California. Before this, he spent nearly 16 years at Sunstone Hotel Investors, rising to senior vice president, chief administrative officer, secretary and treasurer, where he oversaw corporate functions and played a pivotal role in managing a $3.9 billion asset base.
“Lindsay’s extensive background leading hotel operations and real estate investment platforms makes him an invaluable addition to our leadership team,” said Greg Friedman, managing principal and CEO of Peachtree. “His experience across public REITs, private equity and owner-operator platforms uniquely positions him to enhance value creation for our investors while strengthening our asset management capabilities.”
His career also includes senior leadership roles at Magna Flow as chief operating officer and at Alpha Wave Investors as chief administrative officer and partner where he directed strategic planning, growth initiatives and asset repositioning strategies. Earlier in his career, Monge held management positions at The Westgate Hotel and began his hospitality career in Hilton’s executive management program at the Waldorf Astoria in New York.
Monge earned an MBA in strategy and leadership from the Drucker School of Management at Claremont Graduate University. He holds a bachelor’s degree in hotel administration from Cornell University’s Nolan School of Hotel Administration. He also completed executive education in the LEAD Business Program at Stanford Graduate School of Business.
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Fortune | There’s no doubt that commercial real estate, and especially the office market, is undergoing a seismic transformation, one that’s not likely to abate any time soon. A boom time of near-zero-interest-rate policy, abundant liquidity, and cap rate compression over the past decade has given way to a perfect storm–a wall of maturing debt, tightened lending conditions, and cratering property values–all amid higher interest rates that show no sign of returning to their pre-2022 lows.
The outlook for the office sector has been particularly negative. It’s a tale of two markets right now: roughly 30% of office buildings account for 90% of the vacancies and may never recover, while the other 70% have the chance to stabilize over time. Either way, the office market finds itself at an inflection point, much like the retail market as mall acquisitions were being financed.