Christmas came early for the owners of Ensemble Real Estate Solutions and Investments.
That’s because the company announced its purchase of the Best Western Plus Arroyo Roble Hotel & Creekside Villas, located in Uptown. The sale closed on Thursday, Dec. 12, for $32 million.
With this acquisition Ensemble now owns 11 hospitality properties across the country, including two in Arizona.
“This property originally piqued our interest because of its unique location in Uptown Sedona and its proximity to the Sedona Arts Center,” said Randy McGrane, Ensemble’s managing director and CEO. “Now that the purchase is complete, we look forward to being a productive member of the community and a strong supporter of the Sedona Arts Center.”
As for why they chose to buy in Sedona, McGrane said it wasn’t even originally on their radar.
“We had not focused on Sedona but I personally split my time between Flagstaff and Phoenix and over the past several years I’ve spent more and more time in Northern Arizona and had been hoping to find a project that captures the spirit of this amazing part of the state,” he said. “It’s under-appreciated in my opinion. There’s a lot more than skiing, summer homes and [Northern Arizona University] that should be explored.”
The hotel will continue to be managed by Aimbridge Hospitality. McGrane said the purchase will have no impact on staff at the hotel.
In December 2017, Scottsdale-based Glacier House Hotels bought the hotel from Arroyo Roble Hotel & Creekside Villas LLC for $25.5 million.
According to their website, Ensemble has several offices and employees that are considered to be the best online UK stock brokers across the country and has been in business for more than 30 years.
“Ensemble is a versatile real estate company that envisions, manages, brokers and owns transformative projects in the health care, hospitality, commercial and urban multifamily/mixed-use sectors,” the website states.
As part of this acquisition, Ensemble plans to purchase and display artwork from the Sedona Arts Center on an ongoing basis.
“Having Ensemble purchase the Arroyo Roble Hotel will be a wonderful benefit to our community,” said Vince Fazio, executive director of the Sedona Arts Center. “We are thrilled with our new neighbors and look forward to many years of productive and creative partnership.”
McGrane said when they visited the property they were struck by the potential and inspired by the people at Sedona Arts Center. From that he had a vision for how this property could be developed to embrace SAC and make the arts an experience, not a passive exercise.
“But that vision had to be tested by a disciplined process to make sure we understood the economics and financial feasibility,” he said.
Arroyo Roble has 65 guest rooms, including five oversized rooms, seven two-bedroom villas and a two-bedroom cottage. For now, that will remain the same.
“We are keeping staff and are pleased that the current assistant manager was promoted to general manager,” McGrane said. “We have a hit list of issues that are largely deferred maintenance in nature. But we understand that redeveloping this property requires patience and listening in abundance and that is what we are focused on. We are high-touch owners and the staff should expect to see me on property on a fairly regular basis. People are what makes the difference in our opinion.”
