This article might happen explain it a little more......
Dethroned condo king Stinson makes play for Hamilton condo
Posted: February 29, 2008, 8:58 PM by Barry Hertz
Real estate
By Natalie Alcoba, National Post
Harry Stinson, Toronto’s dethroned “condo king,†has made a play for a downtown Hamilton landmark, hoping to restore it and build a new condo tower that could soar up to 80 floors.
Mr. Stinson, who recently moved to Hamilton after losing control of the 1 King West condo hotel in downtown Toronto, is prepared to pay $9.5-million for the Royal Connaught Hotel, which has been waiting empty, stripped of its interior contents, for a prospective buyer.
He said he has the money, but will take 30 days to make sure the building, which covers about one street block, is worth buying. The deal would close at the end of June, said Mr. Stinson, who filed for bankruptcy protection last year after a $12-million dispute over 1 King West with prominent theatre producer David Mirvish, who largely financed the project.
“I’m really picking myself up and starting all over here,†Mr. Stinson said of his work in Hamilton. Still, he said investors have not been hard to come by. “I’m not obviously happy with what happened in Toronto but I’m not walking away and forgetting. I’m keeping up my fight to vindicate myself on it, but I’m not doing it in the public eye.â€
In the meantime, he is busy trying to convince Hamilton officials to let him build an 80-storey condo tower.
“Their eyebrows rose a little bit when I showed them a drawing, but that’s the whole idea here. This is going to have to be something that is really striking and is actually so outrageous that in itself becomes self fulfilling,†Mr. Stinson said.
“Our objective is to go tall. Can we get 80 storeys? I have no idea. That is what we are going to start with. We are going to try to make it a building they will find appealing, because their objective is really to galvanize that whole downtown core.â€
The sleek condo tower is the second phase of a development project that will start with retrofitting the existing Connaught, circa 1916, into a combination boutique hotel and residences. The first four floors will house a refurbished ballroom, plus about 100 hotel suites, while “compact†condo units similar to those found at 1 King West will take up the remaining 10 floors.
Mr. Stinson said it could be up and running by Christmas 2009, but did not have a timeline for the construction of the adjacent tower. The hotel units will start at about $130,000; condos in the tower will range from $300,000 to $1-million, Mr. Stinson said.
Rendering of Stinson's proposed 80-storey condo tower by Stanford Downey Architects Inc.
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