Westin Hotels Owners Mum on Report of Possible Sale

Westin Hotels & Resorts Co. may be put up for sale by its owners, Goldman, Sachs & Co. and Starwood Capital Group LP, which have set an asking price of $1 billion.

Hotel analysts on Monday said that likely buyers of the chain could include Bethesda, Md.-based Marriott International Inc., Doubletree Corp. and Starwood Lodging Trust. Barry Sternlicht, who is chairman and chief executive of Starwood Lodging, also has a stake in Westin as president and CEO of Starwood Capital Group.

The proposed sale of Westin, first reported in the Wall Street Journal on Monday, comes amid continuing consolidation in the hotel industry, which after facing difficulties in the 1980s and early 1990s, is experiencing strong growth, especially among upscale properties, analysts said. Recently, Marriott agreed to pay $1 billion for the Renaissance Hotel Group, and Beverly Hills-based Hilton Hotels Corp. has made a hostile bid for Sheraton parent ITT Corp.

Westin and Goldman Sachs would not comment Monday about the possible sale of Westin. Sternlicht of Starwood Capital said the owners haven’t settled on whether to sell. But a Westin spokesman told Bloomberg News that the company does not expect to file papers in the first quarter to sell the chain to the public in a stock offering, as it said it would on Nov. 15.

Sternlicht did not return several phone calls for further comment.

Westin, which owns and operates 102 hotels worldwide, fits the upscale niche. The chain would be attractive to bidders because it costs less to buy upscale properties than to build new ones, analysts said.

“At the right price, Marriott, Doubletree and Starwood would love to have Westin,” said Paul Keung, a hotel analyst for PaineWebber Inc. in New York.