Dallas-Fort Worth hotel foreclosure filings more than triple

Business and tourist travel is picking up, but the number of Dallas-Fort Worth hotels facing foreclosure this year has more than tripled.  So far in 2010, 94 North Texas hotel foreclosure filings have been recorded. There were 30 filings for the same period in 2009, according to Foreclosure Listing Service Inc.  ”Among D-FW hotels, the threat of foreclosure has skyrocketed over the past two years,” said George Roddy, president of the Addison-based foreclosure-tracking firm. “For the upcoming foreclosure auctions on Oct. 5, eight postings have been filed, threatening hotel projects within the area.”

The hotels threatened with forced sale include the Crowne Plaza inAddison , the Radisson Hotel and Suites near Love Field and the Element Hotel on LBJ Freeway near Dallas/Fort Worth InternationalAirport.  Hotels with more than $120 million in debt are up for auction next month by the lenders, Foreclosure Listing Service reports.  ”The vast majority of the hotel foreclosure postings involved smaller, class B and C projects,” Roddy said.

Some of the biggest local foreclosure filings this year have been for hotels. The foreclosure of the 431-room Four Seasons Resort and Club Dallas at Las Colinas with $175 million in debt was the largest such mortgage default in North Texas in about two decades.  Hotel market analysts say the surge in hotel foreclosures is typical for the economic times.  ”People are hanging on by their fingernails, and just as things start to get better, they run out of fingernails,” said longtime Texas hotel market consultant John Keeling. “The recession has just gone on too long.”  Click here for full report from Dallas  Morning News…