Just like Eloise, you too can become a fixture at the Plaza

Owning your hotel room sounds like the ultimate luxury.

“It’s the Eloise factor,” said Vivian Deuschl, corporate vice president of public relations for Ritz-Carlton.

Ah, yes, Eloise, the eponymous 6-year-old heroine of the children’s book series who lived in New York’s Plaza Hotel. A typically idle afternoon was spent braiding the ears of her pet turtle and ordering “one roast-beef bone, one raisin and seven spoons” from room service.

Having the perks of a five-star resort or hotel -- concierge, chef, spa treatments and prime tee times -- at your fingertips is undeniably alluring. And it’s one reason, experts say, that so-called condo-hotels are booming. Even Eloise’s beloved Plaza, a Central Park fixture for decades, will soon be converted into a mix of condos, hotel rooms and stores.

But that’s not the only reason for the surge. Some buyers are eager to have someone else take care of what serves as a second or third home.

Some crave the prestige of a Ritz-Carlton or Four Seasons address. In fact, the Ritz plans to open a condo-only project in two years at Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. Prices for the 174 units range from $798,000 for a one-bedroom to nearly $5 million for a penthouse.

Other buyers hope to recoup the purchase price in resales or room rentals. That may or may not happen; as with all real estate, prices fluctuate. And there are expenses along the way.

But one thing is certain: Condo-hotels can be good deals for developers and the lenders who back them. Instead of waiting years for a return on their investment, earned night by night as rooms are rented, they get the money upfront from unit buyers. That means you.

The economics are so compelling that “there’s no project we have on the books that won’t have a residential component,” said Ritz-Carlton’s Deuschl.

Once mostly found in ski towns and in resorts in Mexico, the Caribbean and other sunny climates, the condo-hotel trend has been spreading across the U.S.

The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas plans to open sales May 1 on 1,200 condos and residences in five towers next door, said Hard Rock spokesman Spencer Villasenor. Studios will start at $450,000; multistory poolside bungalows will start at $2.5 million.

On the Strip, the first tower at the Residences at MGM Grand has sold out, the second is nearly sold out and the third will go on sale this month, said operations manager Jeff Yamaguchi. Studios start at $450,000.

Other condo-hotel projects have recently opened or will open soon in Seattle, Chicago and other cities.

Whether these are good deals for vacationers or individual investors is hard to say. Many projects are too new to have a resale record.

“They can be good investments,” said Bruce Baltin, senior vice president in Los Angeles for PKF Consulting, an international firm of consultants in the hotel and tourism industry. “But like everything, there will be winners and losers.”

Bill Fischer, chief executive of New York-based Fischer Travel, a high-end personal concierge service that includes trip planning, said his clients weren’t thinking about profit when they spent up to $10 million for residences at resorts in the Caribbean and elsewhere.

“They just want to be there” and enjoying privacy, security and service, he said. “If you need a boat for the day, a small plane ... whatever you’re looking to do, it’s provided for you.”

Here are some issues to consider if you’re thinking about buying into a condo-hotel.

The first: Can I occupy my unit year-round?

Fischer’s clients, for instance, generally buy units or homes for their own use, not to rent them out. The 12 condominiums atop the Ritz-Carlton New York, Central Park, which run up to 9,500 square feet and have fetched up to $28 million each, also serve as homes for their owners.

These types of units, typically called “residences,” are in high-end hotels. Their major appeal is service; the concierge is included. But it’s not all free.

“As soon as you pick up the phone and say, ‘I’d like to have turn-down service or the dog walked,’ your house account is being charged,” said Matthew Hall, spokesman for New York-based Millennium Partners, which developed the Ritz condos. Dog-walking is about $35 an hour, he added.

If you’re not at the Ritz and your unit isn’t called a residence, you may face limits on how often you can occupy it.

Owners of the 413 casitas at the Camelback Inn, a JW Marriott Resort & Spa in Scottsdale, Ariz., may stay in their units up to 28 days a year; otherwise, they’re open for nightly rental to hotel guests, said June Durkin, broker-dealer for the casitas.

Owners can also trade days for stays at other Marriott resorts. This may sound like a timeshare, but here’s the difference: Each owner gets a piece of the revenue from room rentals, minus maintenance and various other expenses and a 20% fee to Marriott, Durkin said.

At other hotels, unit owners may split room revenue 50-50 with the hotel and pay maintenance fees that can total hundreds of dollars a month. There’s no standard way of handling this. As with any real estate investment, you’ll owe taxes on your unit too.

So another key question is this: What expenses are involved in owning a unit? Besides taxes and maintenance, there may be assessments for housekeeping, capital improvements, liability insurance and more.

The third question: What will I earn from the unit if I rent it out? That’s not easy to calculate. Room rates and occupancy vary throughout the year. At the Camelback Inn, a casita that goes for $439 a night during peak season may go for $160 a night during the summer, Durkin said.

“What happens when the cash flow from the hotel declines and you still need to pay the mortgage?” PKF’s Baltin asked.

That’s something, I’m sure, Eloise never had to think about.

Hear more tips from Jane Engle on Travel Insider topics at latimes.com/engle. She welcomes comments but can’t respond individually to letters and calls. Write to Travel Insider, L.A. Times, 202 W. 1st St., L.A., CA 90012, or e-mail jane.engle@latimes.com.