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Date Posted: 16:00:18 02/10/03 Mon
Author: talkonline
Subject: Zoffinger & Kushner PERFECT TOGETHER?

Maybe we just haven't been giving the NORTH JERSEY "who's who" enough attention????? Google search link KUSHNER + ZOFFINGER click here....ZOFFINGER-is on the commitee to make a reccomendation in 90 days about SLOT MACHINES at race tracks,he is the HEAD OF THE SPORTS AND EXPOSITION AUTHORITY,.........KUSHNER,well we have talked about him here recently,he had some kind of argument with our SENATOR GORMLEY-(Star-ledger),He also appears to be VERY GOOD FRIENDS with ZOFFINGER.......THE ENTIRE MEADOWLANDS EXPANSION PROJECT IS UNDER QUESTION BUT ZOFFINGER SAYS THAT HE WILL OFFICIALLY NAME THE DEVELOPER ON WEDNSDAY.(NYTimes today).

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[> KUSHNNER-SLUM LORD to HOTEL MAGNATE? -- from today's JERSEY JOURNAL, 17:33:34 02/10/03 Mon

Clipped below, an item on the TAX DOLLAR SUCKING SLUM LORD (if you consider low-cost Mount Laural housing project builder "slums"). SCUM! YOU TAKE OUR MONEY SCUM (KUSHNER) THEN,you give $$ to DEMOCRATS THAT LINE YOUR POCKETS WITH MORE STATE AND FEDERAL TAX DOLLARS for your GOVERNMENT FUNDED PROJECTS! ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!-NO WONDER THIS STATE NEEDS MONEY! WITH KUSHNER AND HIS FRIEND ZOFFINGER TAKING MONEY FROM THE STATE LEFT AND -SHOULD I SAY LEFT. AND NOW THIS TAKER OF PUBLIC MONEY/SPENDER OF TAXPAYER MONEY, IS GOING INTO THE HOTEL BIZ?????????????????? and WANTS TO RUN A sTATE AGENCY.??????????? the more i find out about this cast of characters Kushner enters glamorous, risky world of boutique hotels



Monday, February 10, 2003


By George E. Jordan
Newhouse News Service

Hunched over blueprints in a construction trailer near the entrance to the Holland Tunnel in Jersey City, Charles Ramat is explaining how Kushner Cos. is quickly moving into the hotel business.

Ramat, Kushner's president and chief executive, said the company plans to open 40 boutique hotels over the next five years and franchise them under the name Westminster Hotels. A boutique hotel offers high-end service, fine architecture and style.

"We believe it's a perfectly fine time to go into the hotel business," he said.

Others in the struggling hospitality industry aren't so sure.

They question the timing and say Kushner - a privately-owned office developer and one of the nation's largest apartment companies - will need to make a massive investment to create a premium brand like Fairmont Hotels and Resorts, W Hotels and St. Regis.

"A company (not in the hotel franchise business) saying, 'We're going to start our own brand' is a tall order," said Peter Keim, a vice president of PKF Consulting, a hospitality industry adviser and appraiser. "That's not to say it can't be done, but I can't say how much it is going to cost them to get brand equity, loyalty and identification."

While Kushner's sights ultimately are set on high-end travelers, the company also is going after different pieces of the market. The blueprints for the $15 million project currently being called Holland Hotel show the finished property flying a Holiday Inn flag.

Ramat said the Jersey City hotel, a former 1960s-era Quality Inn damaged by fire four years ago, was too modest for a Westminster brand, but the company could not pass up the deal.

Rebuilding the Holland into a 150-room Holiday Inn promises to be extremely lucrative, and putting an established brand's name on it when it opens in two years will appeal, he said, to the target audience: Manhattan-bound business travelers and tourists. Its location has in the past been favored by tour bus groups because it can be significantly cheaper to stay on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River.

The hotel business is part of Kushner Cos.' attempt to expand into seven states in the Northeast. The company, based in Florham Park, already has an empire that includes more than 24,000 apartment units and 7.5 million square feet of office, industrial and retail space.

The company's chairman, Charles Kushner, also owns a stake in NorCrown Bank, as well as insurance, title and technology companies.

The prototype for the Westminster brand sits on West Mount Pleasant Avenue in Livingston and started accepting reservations this week. Kushner spent $25 million to partially demolish the former Grand Hotel, which was part of the Travelodge chain, and transform it into a 190-room, 10-suite luxury hotel.

It offers finely appointed rooms, white-glove dining and a massive catering hall that targets affluent families and businesses in neighboring Millburn, Short Hills, Maplewood and West Orange.

Rooms cost $159 to $279 per night. The Westminster is located in the Newark Airport-Union County submarket, where last year hotels operated at only 63 percent capacity and room rates averaged $92.80, down 7.7 percent from 2001.

The Holland Hotel's Jersey City-Hudson County submarket recorded similar declines and the entire industry is still reeling from the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Miles Berger, owner of Newark's Robert Treat Hotel and Kushner's partner in the Holland project, said he expects "the market will have turned around" by the time the Holland Hotel is ready to open in 18 to 20 months.

Berger said hotels were "the next logical real estate avenue for Kushner" and that the Livingston and Jersey City properties were not high-risk because "these are medium-size hotels. It's more controllable."


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