One of Baltimore’s biggest hotels auctioned off in 47 seconds

It took 19 minutes to explain the terms of the auction. It took 47 seconds to auction off a hotel that nobody wanted for more than $30 million.

The Renaissance Harborplace Baltimore Hotel — once a part of downtown’s rebirth — will soon be owned by its lender, DR VII REIT Holdings, a subsidiary of New York-based Torchlight Investors.

Torchlight foreclosed on the property late last year. Wednesday’s auction on the steps of the Baltimore Circuit Courthouse felt more like a formality. The event drew a dozen onlookers, half of whom were journalists.

A representative for Torchlight bid $30 million for the 622-room hotel on East Pratt Street, one of the biggest hotels in Baltimore. No one else raised their hand.

That price was a significant discount from when it last sold in July 2020 to the Buccini Pollin Group, a real estate management company headquartered in Maryland and Delaware. The firm bought the Renaissance Harborplace for $80 million and later borrowed $71 million against the property.

Court records show the Buccini Pollin Group defaulted on that $71 million loan last fall while the hotel dealt with a host of problems, including broken boilers, malfunctioning elevators and a linen shortage.

When it opened in 1988, the hotel, then known as the Stouffer Harborplace, capped a flurry of hotel construction downtown. It was the third and final piece of a mixed-use development that took up a city block on East Pratt Street and included a now-defunct mall called The Gallery and a 28-story office tower.

The complex was an extension of the Harborplace pavilions, which opened in 1980 to wild success. The Rouse Co. developed both projects and connected them via a sky bridge over Pratt Street.

Over time, the enthusiasm for Baltimore’s festival marketplaces waned, and the Rouse Co. sold its downtown assets. In 2005, a California-based real estate investment trust bought the hotel, which had rebranded as the Renaissance Harborplace under Marriott International.

Now, Harborplace is expected to be demolished as part of a major redevelopment plan by MCB Real Estate. At an October 2023 press conference, the firm talked about its plan to construct five buildings, including three commercial structures that would total more than 400,000 square feet. One building, called “The Sail,” would feature a curved roof with a park on top that would be open to the public.

MCB also proposed building two residential towers in a “step-down” design, stretching 32 and 25 stories high, and containing as many as 900 units total.