In Las Vegas, you can't count on a project getting finished until the doors actually open. It's not entirely uncommon for a company to run out of money during construction and have to pause, or even abandon, its plans.
That happened in an extreme way with Fontainebleau Las Vegas a resort casino on the north Strip which has taken 20 years and multiple owners to build. There were times when the project was abandoned and seemed doomed, but now, back under its original owner Fontainebleau Las Vegas has been hiring staff and taking reservations for a Dec. 13 opening.
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Another massive project, the Las Vegas Sphere, could easily have suffered the same fate or not been completed at all. That revolutionary concert, movie, and live event venue ran about $1 billion over its original budget which forced its original owner, Madison Square Garden Entertainment to sell some assets, lay off employees, and spin The Sphere out into its own company.
Still, Fontainebleau Las Vegas and The Sphere shows that you can never count a Las Vegas Strip project as dead until something else gets built on the intended land. That was why even though construction has been stopped for nearly a year, people never fully gave up on Dream, Las Vegas, a boutique hotel that was started near Harry Reid Airport.
Now, new papers filed with Clark County suggest that construction could restart in early 2024.
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Living the Las Vegas Strip Dream
Dream Las Vegas sits on an underdeveloped part of the Las Vegas Strip that's right next to Harry Reid International Airport. The project, which is also near the famed "Welcome to Las Vegas" sign ground to a halt earlier this year when Shopoff Realty Investments said it needed time to get its financing in order.
Now, the owner has filed new paperwork with Clark County which suggests that has finally happened, KTNV Las Vegas reported.
"Due to the destabilization of the financial markets over the last eight or nine months, construction loan financing was stalled, which has caused a temporary work stoppage on the site," the documents read in part. "[We] anticipate the bridge loan to close within the next two weeks followed by the close of the full capital stack [equity and debt] by Dec. 2023 with a full restart of construction by McCarthy Construction on Jan. 1, 2024."
That's welcome news for a project where some of the buildings are standing where every day they sit unfinished could add to the overall cost. The property's owner has also filed to extend its building permits for a year as some of them could expire before the new financing kicks in.
Dream Las Vegas faces debt
Construction stopped on Dream Las Vegas because its owner had $25-30 million in unpaid construction bills. The project is expected to cost between $550 and $575 million.
Shopoff confirmed in a statement to the Las Vegas Review-Journal "that it expects to close on an updated construction loan by the end of the year and said the pause in construction will delay the opening of the project by about a year." That will push the opening of Dream Las Vegas from late-2024 to late-2025.
No official opening date has been set yet.
When construction first began, Shopoff promised a 531-room lifestyle hotel and casino with seven experiential dining and nightlife venues, 12,000 square feet of meeting and event space, and a 20,000-square-foot casino.
"This project represents a new type of Vegas hotel experience, offering tourists and locals alike a unique boutique hotel option on the Las Vegas Strip. We are thrilled to break ground on Dream Las Vegas and watch as it energizes the southern end of the Strip, while providing countless jobs and revenue for local government," explained Shopoff Realty Investments CEO William Shopoff at the time.
