Sam Chang Sells 3 Midtown Hotels for $200M

Sam Chang has sold off another big piece of his hotel empire.

The developer’s McSam Hotel Group sold three hotels along Fifth Avenue in Midtown for more than $200 million, property records filed Thursday show.

The hotels are the 162-room Fifth Avenue Hyatt at 16 East 39th Street ($51.3 million), the 165-room Marriott Le Méridien at 292 Fifth Ave ($76.3 million) and the 230-room DoubleTree by Hilton at 25 West 51st Street ($78.9 million).

The identity of the buyer wasn’t clear; paperwork for the LLCs that purchased the properties was signed by an attorney, Jennifer Adams Shepler at Eckert Seamens based in Pittsburgh.

The same Eckert Seamens office represented a buyer three years ago who bought a hotel from Chang for $147 million. The buyer was Phoenix Hospitality Group, according to Crain’s.

Shepler declined to comment. Chang and Phoenix Hospitality did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Chang purchased the properties in 2016 and 2017 for a total of about $169 million.

It’s the latest sell-off for Chang, who in 2019 said he was retiring after the city passed laws limiting new hotel development. (Chang had previously said he planned to retire and ended up sticking around.)

Earlier this year, Chang sold a trio of Hilton-branded hotels at 150 West 48th Street to Magna Hospitality Group for $160 million in September. And in May, he sold the Holiday Inn at 37-10 10th Street in Long Island City for $76.5 million to Bayrock Capital.

In 2020, he sold the 531-key property at 140 West 28th Street in Chelsea for $147 million to Phoenix Hospitality.