Outrigger will manage the Ala Moana Hotel

More than 1,000 of the individually owned units will be managed as vacation rentals

Outrigger Enterprises Group closed a deal yesterday to take over the hotel operations at Ala Moana Hotel.

Outrigger affiliate ALM LLC acquired the hotel operations from affiliates of the hotel's owner, Crescent Heights Inc., for an undisclosed price.

The 1,154-room property at Ala Moana Center will continue to be known as the Ala Moana Hotel.

Miami-based Crescent Heights bought the hotel in October 2004, and spent millions upgrading the 36-story property before selling the individual hotel-condominium units to buyers.

ALA MOANA HOTEL Address: 410 Atkinson Drive Total units: 1,154 Old operator: Crescent Heights affiliates New operator: Outrigger Enterprises Group affiliate

Included in the new acquisition are the front desk, parking, restaurant spaces, meeting and banquet rooms and most retail and office spaces.

All of the units are individually owned, but more than 1,000 of them are entered into a vacation rental program that will be managed by another Outrigger affiliate beginning this quarter.

Approximately 450 employees at Ala Moana Hotel will be transferred over to the new ownership. A notice was filed with the state Department of Labor and Industrial Relations yesterday.

"The Ala Moana Hotel has been superbly renovated and is a proud addition to our fine family of accommodations in Hawaii and the Pacific," said David Carey, chief executive officer of Outrigger. "This landmark property adds more than 1,000 guest rooms to our inventory. It fits perfectly with our strategy of reaching out to leisure, business and kamaaina travelers with quality, moderately priced accommodations."

Carey said the transition in ownership and management should be seamless for guests, employees and owners of hotel units.

He described the remodeled hotel as having a clean, contemporary atmosphere, with a full range of amenities that include a fitness center, retail shops and banquet and meeting rooms.

"The Ala Moana Hotel has become well-established as a result of more than three decades of doing business and is a name that can stand on its own," Carey said.

Since September 2005, Outrigger has provided advisory services for the hotel's current management.

"This is an established part of our business," said Mel Kaneshige, senior vice president of Outrigger Enterprises.

Outrigger also recently took over the management contract for the 847-room Pacific Beach Hotel in Waikiki.

That deal was announced in October and took effect on Monday. A total of about 550 employees at Pacific Beach were transferred to Outrigger.

Before the two new agreements, Outrigger already managed about 1,500 condotel units in the state, including the Outrigger Luana Waikiki.

"So in the space of three days, from Jan. 1 to Jan. 3, all of a sudden our inventory grew by about 2,000 more units," Kaneshige said.

Outrigger is finishing up the first phase of its $535 million Waikiki Beach Walk revitalization project on eight acres in the heart of Waikiki.

Crescent Heights, which also built Koolani, a luxury residential tower in Kakaako, will focus on its other projects, including a condo-hotel development at Ko Olina, according to regional marketing director Kathryn Acorda.