Las Vegas airline closes $200M sale of Florida resort

Allegiant Air’s parent company completed the sale of its Florida resort, a side venture that grappled with pandemic delays, several hurricanes and steep financial losses.

Las Vegas-based Allegiant Travel Co. closed its $200 million sale of Sunseeker Resort Charlotte Harbor to New York investment giant Blackstone on Thursday. The purchase included a related golf course.

Allegiant, which announced the deal in July, said it expects to use the sales proceeds to pay down corporate debt and for other general corporate purposes.

The sale marks the conclusion of a project outside aviation that the deep-discount airline initially said would transform the region’s tourism industry. But the resort ended up in the red, and Allegiant sold the property less than two years after it opened, for a price that was far below what the carrier borrowed to help pay for construction.

The 22-acre, 785-room riverfront resort in southwest Florida includes food and beverage outlets, pools, a spa and more than 60,000 square feet of indoor meeting space, according to a news release this summer.

Allegiant opened Sunseeker in late 2023, after the company obtained a $350 million loan to help finance the development.

Sunseeker’s occupancy rate in the second quarter this year was 51 percent, the company reported.

‘Significant operating losses’

Allegiant has said that, as with many new hotels or resorts, Sunseeker’s booking and occupancy rates were lower than more established properties.

The company also said that Sunseeker incurred “significant operating losses” last year and that occupancy was compromised by three major hurricanes.

Last year, its Sunseeker Resort business unit posted a $402.7 million loss before income taxes, according to a securities filing.

In the first half of this year, the Sunseeker unit posted a nearly $126 million loss before income taxes.

An ultra-low-cost carrier, Allegiant is known for flying from small, underserved cities to warm-weather vacation spots, often without competition on its routes. It also has a history of ventures outside aviation, including arcades, golf course management software and, as seen with Sunseeker, resort construction.

Allegiant broke ground on Sunseeker in 2019, saying the resort was expected to “transform hospitality, dining and tourism in the area.”

It had a captive audience of sorts, as Allegiant was the only commercial carrier that served nearby Punta Gorda Airport, which was also one of its top airports for passenger growth at the time.

Hurricanes

Allegiant, however, suspended construction in March 2020 amid the early chaos of the pandemic and resumed building the project more than a year later, in summer 2021.

It obtained a $350 million construction loan for the project in fall 2021.

Sunseeker was also impacted by hurricanes Ian, Idalia, Debby, Helene and Milton between 2022 and 2024, Allegiant has said.

In fall 2022, for instance, Allegiant said the under-construction resort sustained $35 million in damages from Hurricane Ian, after cranes fell on the project and water got in.

In fall 2024, Hurricane Milton made landfall on the west coast of Florida, and Sunseeker was within the evacuation zone, Allegiant said. It temporarily halted operations at the resort and reopened a week later with limited services.

Allegiant previously reported this year that it recorded $87.2 million in hurricane-related losses for Sunseeker and $58.6 million in insurance recoveries.

Contact Eli Segall at esegall@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0342.