Questions
Short answers to the questions hotel owners ask us, each developed on its own page.
How do you sell a hotel discreetly?
By entrusting the sale, under an exclusive mandate, to an adviser who publishes nothing: no listings or portals, an anonymous teaser, an NDA before any identifying information, and qualified buyers approached one at a time. Staff and the market hear of the sale only when the seller decides.
Should you sell the property or the business of your hotel?
It depends on what you own and what you want to keep. Selling property and business together reaches the widest range of buyers. Selling the business alone requires a sound commercial lease. Selling the property alone means selling an investment backed by rent. If one company owns it all, you can sell its shares.
Who pays the agency fees when a hotel is sold?
The mandate decides. At RR Hôtels & Finance, fees are set in the mandate in line with our published scale. Whether the seller or the buyer bears them is stated in the mandate and disclosed to the buyer at the first exchange. The scale is displayed, as French law (the loi Hoguet) requires.
How long does it take to sell a hotel?
There is no standard time frame. It depends mainly on file preparation, the structure chosen (property, business or shares), the strength of the buyer and the conditions to be satisfied before completion. A sale runs in three phases: preparing, finding and negotiating with the right buyer, then signing and completing.
How is the price of a hotel calculated?
A hotel’s price starts from its trading: adjusted EBITDA, restated to reflect normal operation. It is valued with a multiple, cross-checked by discounted cash flow, the capitalisation of a market rent for the property and comparable deals. Planned capex is then deducted and, for a share sale, net debt.
Should you tell your staff that your hotel is being sold?
Not at the start: confidentiality protects the operation and the team itself. But depending on the company and the deal structure, French law may require employees to be informed before the sale (the so-called “loi Hamon”) and the works council (CSE), if any, to be consulted. Your lawyer sets the timetable.
Planning a sale?
Let’s talk, in confidence.
