Grand Villa Hotel sale halted as owners pledge to pay debt

What you need to know:

  • In the mid of May, the TIB Development Bank advertised the sale of the property located on 245 and 247 Block 45c at Kijitonyama area with the size of 4,697 square metres.

Dar es Salaam. Management of the Grand Villa Hotel, which has been earmarked for sale to recover a TIB Development Bank loan, says it expects to repay its loans in order to stop the planned auction of its two-storey property.

In the mid of May, the TIB Development Bank advertised the sale of the property located on 245 and 247 Block 45c at Kijitonyama area with the size of 4,697 square metres.

The bank set a minimum price of Sh1.59 billion after the hotel owner failed to repay the mortgage loan.

However, the Marketing Manager of the Grand Villa Hotel Company, Mr Said Nzaro, told The Citizen that the management has worked day and night in a bid to stop the auction and succeeded to get the money to service the loan.

“Both parties agreed about stopping the auction as talks on loan repayment continue,” he said.

“We did not refuse to service our loan. We just proposed to amend the contract so that we can reduce the amount by at least 50 per cent.”

He said, the business climate has changed, so they could have struggled to repay the bank the same amount in accordance with the contract.

Mr Nzaro, however, declined to disclose the amount their hotel owes the bank. According to him, the remaining debt was within the hotel’s capacity to pay only if the bank gave them more time.

“I am positive that the remaining debt can be fully repaid within two years that is why we decided to suspend the auction,” he said.

He clarified that the property listed for sale was a two-storey building located at Makumbusho and not the Kijitonyama’s 10-storey building as various media platforms claim.

“It’s true that we have received several bids, but there is no auction is going to take place,” he said.