Urban Hotel Capital acquires, develops, and operates upper midscale and select-service hotels across the Eastern Seaboard. We have been at this since 1997 — through multiple interest rate cycles, brand consolidations, and market corrections. The firm is not a fund looking for a first deal. It is a company with a 30-year operating history, a proprietary management platform, and an active development pipeline.
Viral H. Patel started in hotel operations — revenue management and front office — at major branded properties in Manhattan and Queens. That background, working inside hotels before owning them, shaped how Urban Hotel Capital approaches every transaction. We underwrite from the operating side first.
In 1997, Viral founded Azure Hotel Management and began developing the first property — the Hawthorn Suites in Fogelsville, PA, built using modular construction and opened in 1998 under a Wyndham franchise. Six years later came the 111-key Wingate by Wyndham in Brentwood, NY — a five-story panelized steel structure that required horizontal directional drilling beneath a four-lane divided parkway just to connect the sewer line. A $12.6 million project that most developers looked at and walked away from.
In 2009, the firm executed its first major distressed acquisition — the Holiday Inn Plainview, NY, purchased from Astoria Federal Bank via all-cash short sale in 14 days at $6 million. A complete gut renovation followed. By 2012, IHG recognized it as Renovation of the Year. The asset sold in 2015 for $18.5 million and again in 2024 for over $21 million.
Urban Hotel Capital's current flagship project is the 221-key, 26-story Hilton Garden Inn at 93-43 Sutphin Boulevard in Downtown Jamaica, Queens. The site sits directly across from the JFK AirTrain Jamaica Station — one of the most transit-connected hotel development sites in the New York metropolitan area. The project carries a 25-year ICIP tax abatement, a Qualified Opportunity Zone designation, and a fully executed Hilton franchise agreement.
In the pipeline: a 120+ room midscale extended-stay hotel at Exit 68 on the Long Island Expressway in Yaphank, NY — a Town of Brookhaven entitlement project with site control secured and municipal approvals in process, targeting a 2027–28 construction start.
Alongside the development pipeline, Urban Hotel Capital is actively building its distressed hotel acquisition program — acquiring franchised hotels in financial difficulty, resolving the capital structure, and operating them through Azure Hotel Management from the day of closing.
We have built hotels under modular construction, panelized structural steel, and concrete high-rise programs. Every project type has required different engineering, different municipal relationships, and different capital structures. We have navigated all of them — and our current pipeline reflects the most complex sites we have ever pursued.
The Holiday Inn Plainview defined our acquisition profile: a franchised asset with clear RevPAR upside, a capital structure problem rather than an operating problem, and a lender that needed certainty of close. We bought it in 14 days, all cash, and had Azure Hotel Management operating it immediately. We are actively pursuing that same profile across the Eastern Seaboard.
Azure Hotel Management is not a third-party operator we bring in after closing. It is our own management company — handling revenue management, brand compliance, staffing, and capital planning on every asset we own, from the day of ownership through final disposition. The operating assumptions in our pro formas are produced by the team that executes them.
Every hotel Urban Hotel Capital owns is managed by Azure Hotel Management from the first day of ownership. There is no gap between what we project in underwriting and what we deliver in operations — because the same team does both. Lenders and equity partners deal with one aligned organization, not a sponsor and a separate operator with different incentives.
Our distressed acquisitions are structured for speed and certainty. The Holiday Inn Plainview closed in 14 days — all cash, no financing contingency, direct from a distressed lender. That ability to close fast is what opens transactions that other buyers never get to see. Special servicers, CMBS lenders, and motivated sellers call us because they know we can perform.
Franchise access is not an afterthought in our underwriting — it is a condition of our deal thesis. Over 30 years we have maintained direct relationships with Marriott, Hilton, IHG, and Wyndham franchise development teams. Before we make an offer on a distressed asset, we already know which flag fits the market and whether we can get it approved. That is not a capability you can build in a transaction.
Urban Hotel Capital has operated through the 2001 downturn, the 2008–09 financial crisis, and the 2020 pandemic — in each case continuing to develop, acquire, and operate hotels. The institutional knowledge from those periods — how brands behave in workouts, how lenders structure distressed sales, how operators protect NOI under cost pressure — is embedded in how we underwrite and manage every transaction today.
Azure Hotel Management was founded in 1997 — the same year as Urban Hotel Capital — and has operated franchised hotels continuously ever since. It is not a management company we engage on a per-deal basis. It is the permanent operating infrastructure of the firm, with direct brand compliance accountability, revenue management systems, and in-house staffing capability across all of our assets.
For lenders, this means the property management company is owned by the same sponsor that holds the equity — eliminating the fee drag, reporting gaps, and incentive misalignment that come with third-party management. For investors, it means the operating projections in our underwriting are produced and accountable to the same team running the hotel.
Learn more about Azure →A 26-story, 221-key Hilton Garden Inn directly across from the JFK AirTrain Jamaica Station — 12 minutes to JFK Airport, 18 minutes to Penn Station via the LIRR. The site was awarded through a competitive GJDC/MTA/LIRR RFP process in 2015. The project carries a 25-year ICIP tax abatement and Qualified Opportunity Zone designation, with an executed Hilton franchise agreement in place.
A 120+ room midscale extended-stay hotel at Exit 68 on the Long Island Expressway, serving the industrial, healthcare, and corporate demand base in eastern Suffolk County. Site control is secured and municipal entitlements are in process through the Town of Brookhaven. Brand selection is underway across the IHG, Hyatt, Marriott, and Hilton extended-stay portfolios — including Atwell Suites, Hyatt Studios, Studio Res by Marriott, and LivSmart by Hilton.