Anguilla Resort Heads Into Receivership

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Feb 4th 2010 at 9:02PM

More resort woes in the Caribbean. The Wall Street Journal reports that Credit Suisse, which represents investors in the Temenos resort on Anguilla, has taken over the project and appointed a receiver to manage it. The resort, which was supposed to have a 32-room hotel and 78 villas offered for sale in the millions, carried a $180 million mortgage. The luxury development was the brainchild of entertainment mogul Robert F.X. Sillerman, who began planning the resort in 2002 and put $180 million of his own money into the project in addition to the monster mortgage. Construction was stopped in 2008 and it is said that the project will need another $125 million for completion. The receiver will be charged with finding a deep-pocketed savior for the project to either finish the resort or take over completely.

Sillerman has had a long career in the entertainment world. In the late 1970s he and a partner created a company that bought up radio and television stations. He used cash from that first venture to build SFX Entertainment into a huge promoter of live entertainment. That company was later sold to Clear Channel for $4.4 billion in 2000. His latest company is CKX, Inc., which we recently wrote about in December. The company bought controlling interest of Elvis Presley Enterprises in 2004 including Graceland and has been working on a major redevelopment project for the 100 acres surrounding the Tennessee home. CKX is also the parent company for Simon Fuller's 19 Entertainment which owns the "American Idol" and "So You Think You Can Dance?" franchises.

Like the Four Seasons Barbados project I mentioned last month, this one also had its share of celebrity investors and other well-heeled buyers, some of who paid deposits of up to 40 percent on idyllic vacation homes. Buyers include bestselling author Dan Brown and television producer Simon Fuller.

Tags: Anguilla, caribbean, foreclosure, hotels in trouble, HotelsInTrouble, receivership, resorts in trouble, ResortsInTrouble, temenos