By Jeff Burbank SPECIAL TO THE RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL
LAS VEGAS – In the latest deal for rebuilding the downtown area, Nevada gaming officials last week gave final approval for the sale of Four Queens hotel to the owner of 15 local cocktail lounges, who got it a bargain price of $20.5 million.
The Gaming Commission granted a request by New York-based Elsinore Corp. to sell the Fremont Street hotel-casino to Magoo video poker bar chain owner Terry Caudill, two years after sales talk began.
David Atwell, president of Resort Properties of America who brokered the sale, said Caudill bought the 690-room hotel-casino at an unusually low price, in part because some investors remain concerned about the business potential of downtown.
“For Terry Caudill, the perception was a good thing,” Atwell said. That enabled him to buy the hotel for under $30,000 a room. That is unheard of.
“And he got it for only four times (cash flow). That is the cheapest you’ll see a gaming property sell.”
By comparison, Atwell said the price that Poster Financial Group partners Tim Poster and Tom Breitling recently paid for the 1,907-room Golden Nugget hotel on Fremont Street amounted to six times cash flow.
“The Four Queens was one of the best buys I’ve ever seen in more than 20 years handling gaming properties here,” Atwell said.
The sale of the 37-year-old Four Queens, with its 32,000-square-foot casino and 1,000 gaming devices, was one of several major deals to close within the past year in the downtown area which had, for many years, suffered from flat casino revenues and lack of interest from investors:
In July 2002, the Isle of Capri sold the Lady Luck casino to a local company, AMX Nevada LLC, for an undisclosed price.
In December, veteran casino owner Jackie Gaughan sold four the Plaza, Las Vegas Club, Gold Spike and Western hotel, and other pieces of downtown property, to Barrick Gaming Corp. for $82 million.
Last month, Poster and Breitling bought the Golden Nugget (and the Golden Nugget Laughlin) from MGM Mirage for $215 million.
Meanwhile, the Chelsea Property Group is putting the finishing touches on a $90 million, 430,000-square-foot outlet mall on 39 acres in the western end of downtown, near a complex that houses most of Clark County’s government services.
“Downtown is on an uptick,” Atwell said. “You’ve got a lot of new blood there.”
Greenspun Media
Michael T. Carr, who spearheaded the national magazine VEGAS by the Greenspun Media Group, was promoted last week to president of the group’s Henderson publishing company.
Greenspun Media, publisher of the Las Vegas Sun, hired Carr in January as vice president of business development to launch VEGAS, described by the company as “the first national lifestyle magazine for Las Vegas.”
He is the former president of publishing for Playboy magazine and former chief executive of Wieder Publications, which publishes such magazines as Men’s Fitness, Flex and Shape.
Roger Saunders, formerly vice president of the media group, also was promoted – to executive vice president – overseeing daily operations of the group’s weekly newspapers and magazines.
Greenspun also publishes the monthly magazine Las Vegas Life and weekly In Business Las Vegas, Las Vegas Weekly and ShowBiz publications.
Citadel Broadcasting
Citadel Broadcasting, the Las Vegas company that operates almost 200 radio stations in the United States, plans to issue an initial public offering this week with 22 million shares priced at $17 to $19 per share.
The company hopes to raise more than $400 in the offering, underwritten by Goldman Sachs and CS First Boston.
Billed as the sixth-largest radio company in the country, Citadel runs 138 FM and 61 AM stations. The company also operates an FM station in Reno under a local marketing agreement.