By Iain Gilbert
Date: Thursday 11 Oct 2018
LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Hostel operator Safestay has acquired the Hotel Opera in central Brussels, its eighth European property, for a total of €1.6m.
Locate on Rue Grétry just off Brussel's Grand Place, the 50-bedroom property is an independently run hotel that has operated for over 30 years.
Safestay will make a cash payment of €1.4m from its existing cash resources, in addition to assuming the hotel's €200,000 of debt, before beginning the property's conversion into a Safestay hostel.
The AIM-listed outfit expects the site to be rebranded and converted into a 200-bed hostel "relatively quickly" at a cost of roughly €200,000.
Safestay chairman Larry Lipman said: "Hotel Opera has been a good hotel but we believe we can make it into an excellent hostel. The building and the central location combine to make it ideal to attract some of the tens of thousands of visitors who come to Brussels each month."
"Given that it is an operating hotel, conversion will be quick and many of the existing operating team will continue under the Safestay brand. We expect the transaction to be immediately earnings enhancing."
As of 0900 BST, Safestay shares had dipped 1.78% to 38.60p.