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Page 18 — COLORADO REAL ESTATE JOURNAL — June 17-June 30, 2015
FIND FINANCING
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location, loan size, and loan type to find lenders
matching your search criteria.
Finance
by John Rebchook
Great Western Bank stepped up
to the plate to finance the 100-
room Source Hotel that Mickey
andKyle Zeppelin plan in the up-
and-coming RiNo neighborhood
at the edge of downtown Denver.
The banking company, with
about a $1.4 billion market cap, is
based in Sioux City, South Dako-
ta. It has a reputation as being one
of the leading agricultural lend-
ing banks in the nation.
More than 25 percent of its out-
standing loans are in the ag busi-
ness.
The $29 million loan Great
Western will be providing to
the Zeppelins for the $41 mil-
lion Source Hotel along Brighton
Boulevard is the type of loan that
helps balance the company’s ag
business.
“The ag sector has seen lower
growth but the benefit of GWB
is that we are also a strong com-
mercial and industrial lending
bank. We have markets in Ari-
zona and Colorado which have
seen tremendous growth which
help offset slower ag markets in
the Midwest,” Ken Karels, presi-
dent and CEO of Great Western
said in a recent interview with
Northwestern Financial Review
magazine.
Great Western has 162 branch
offices, including offices in Lower
Downtown and Cherry Creek
North, where Piper Pierce is the
vice president of business bank-
ing.
She was thrilled to make the
loan to the Zeppelins for the
65,000-square-foot Source Hotel,
which is scheduled to open in
2017 next to the Source artisan
food market at 3550 Brighton
Blvd., which also was developed
by the Zeppelins.
“One of the reasons the Source
Hotel project is appealing to the
bank is due to the primary play-
ers involved that each add their
own areas of expertise,” Pierce
said.
She also likes that the LEED-
certified hotel, designed by Dynia
Architects, will include 25,000 sf
of marketplace amenities.
“The mixed-use aspect of the
project will provide sustain-
ability and appeal for a wide
demographic of travelers seek-
ing upscale accommodations and
locals who have already fallen in
love with the Source Marketplace
and the diversity that the RiNo
District offers,” Pierce said.
She also likes what is happen-
ing in RiNo.
“There are many exciting
movements taking place in the
RiNo District that we feel will
create demand for future Source
Hotel patrons,” Pierce said.
“The migration to the area of
both businesses and residents
coupled with the connectivity
of mass transit seem to provide
fundamentals that will allow the
revitalization of this area to be
sustainable,” Pierce said.
This doesn’t mark Great West-
ern’s first loan to the Zeppelins
in RiNo.
In August 2014, Great Western
Bank worked with the Zeppelins
on financing their 48-unit mul-
tifamily complex, Freight Resi-
dences, in their Taxi campus.
Kyle Zeppelin, who was a
pioneer in RiNo when he and
his father, Mickey, launched the
mixed-use Taxi development in
the neighborhood, said the area is
only getting better.
“RiNo is booming with major
new projects and public infra-
structure, including construction
of the station that is the last train
stop before downtown along the
DIA line and the first dedicated
bike lane in the city on Brighton
Boulevard,” Kyle Zeppelin said.
“RiNo is also the highest con-
centration of new economy jobs
and the largest art district in the
state,” Zeppelin said.
The Source Hotel is the per-
fect complement to RiNo, even
The 100-room Source Hotel, designed by Dynia Architects, is coming to
RiNo.