Hyatt Corp Plans Resort on Northern Pacific

By Ralph Nicholson

Hyatt Hotels and Resorts is to make a second attempt to open a property on Guanacaste’s Pacific coast.

Affiliates of Global Hyatt Corporation and the Costa Rican investment company, Aldesa Inmobiliaria, have announced a management agreement for the 140-room, Park Hyatt Monte del Barco, in the Bay of Culebra, off Peninsula Papagayo.

The $232 million project, which will include a second, as-yet-unnamed hotel, residential condominiums, a beach club and an 18-hold golf course designed by Tom Fazio, will be built on a 425-hectare (1050 acres) property, (pictured) which is part of the government controlled concession, Polo Turístico Golfo de Papagayo.

The developers say they are also looking at the feasibility of including a marina within the project.

The hotel, which is scheduled to open in 2012, will be developed with the US-based resort design company Winding Road. Construction will begin at the end of 2009.

“Signing this contract to operate the prestigious and recognized Park Hyatt brand at this conjuncture validates Monte del Barco as a project and highlights its potential as a real estate investment,” said Javier Cháves, President of Aldesa Inmobiliaria, in a prepared statement.

In the same statement, Pat McCudden, Head of Development for Global Hyatt in Latin America, said Costa Rica had become one of the world’s top destinations with a focus on environmental quality and eco-friendly tourism.

Mr McCudden described the Park Hyatt Monte del Barco, as the group’s first hotel in Costa Rica.

© Photo Courtesy

However, in January this year developers held a formal ground-breaking ceremony for a $300 million Hyatt Resort to be built on 225 hectares (557 acres) just north of the town of Brasilito, also in Guanacaste.

The ceremony was attended by the Minister of Tourism, Carlos Ricardo Benavides, the Minister of Public Works and Transport, Karla González, the Australian golfer Greg Norman, who had agreed to design the resort’s 18-hole golf course, and Jim Abrahamson, the Hyatt Hotels Corporation’s Head of Development in the Americas.

Nearly 12 months later, and two years after the Hyatt Azulera was first announced, the development remains stalled, with the Hyatt Hotels Corporation seemingly disassociating themselves from it.

Repeated requests for clarification have gone unanswered by the Chicago-based corporation, until this week when a Sao Paulo-based spokesperson referred The Beach Times to the project developers, the New Jersey-based Global Financial Group.

Telephone calls to Chief Executive Officer, Anil Kothari, were not returned.

At least six luxury hotel projects on Costa Rica’s Pacific coast, collectively worth more than $1.4 billion, have either been postponed or cancelled in the past 12 months due to the global economic crisis.

However, Aldesa Inmobiliaria says it is well-equipped to ride out the crisis.

“The Project is being financed through a real estate investment fund, an investment tool created for sophisticated investors, regulated and supervised by the Superintendent General,” said Marcela Fernández, a Manager with Aldesa Inmobiliaria.

“Additionally we are negotiating banking financing,” Ms Fernández said. “An important element to point out is that the project has not stopped and the speed at which it is being executed is the appropriate one for the actual market conditions.”