Real estate investor Siegel Group buys 10 acres on Vegas North Strip eyeing potential casino-hotel

Nevada-based real estate investment and management company The Siegel Group announced on Thursday it has acquired three parcels totaling approximately 10 acres on Las Vegas Boulevard. The business, which now owns in total more than 12 acres of contiguous property on the site, is eyeing a project that could include a hotel-casino, condo units, and retail.

The 10 acres, situated along Las Vegas Boulevard and Convention Center Drive, were purchased for $75 million. Siegel Group describes them as “sandwiched in between some of the largest and well-known developments on the Las Vegas Strip,” including Wynn to the south, Genting’s Resorts World directly across the street to the west, the Fontainebleau to the north, and the recently completed $1 billion Las Vegas Convention Center expansion to the east.

Las Vegas Convention Center

Given the group already owns an additional 3 acres contiguous to the three parcels, which currently house Siegel Select Convention Center, the total acreage of the development site is about 13 acres. This, in turn, provides a golden opportunity for the investment firm. “All five parcels are zoned H-1 Limited Resort and Apartment, which is the most valuable and versatile designation as it allows for a variety of developments, including gaming enterprises, compatible commercial, and mixed commercial and residential uses,” the business explains.

With no lender or investor involvement, Siegel Group says it is “not under any time constraints to develop the parcels,” and intends to take its time “strategizing the right development that will maximize the use and value of what is the last great piece of land available on the north strip.” The company says “many potential developers and tenants” have begun expressing interest in the development immediately after the group put the property under contract.

“We’ve been waiting years to acquire a large piece of land on the strip and have been watching this site for a long time,” said Stephen Siegel, President of The Siegel Group. “When this opportunity presented itself there was no question that we had to purchase it. This is a phenomenal property that will one day soon have a development worthy of such an irreplaceable location on the Las Vegas Strip.”

The real estate investor told Las Vegas Review-Journal that the group is planning a trip to Dubai “to get some ideas,” which could influence a future development at the site. The new property would benefit from the north Strip’s momentum in the last years, which has included new projects in an area long bogged down by unfinished megaresorts and little foot traffic.

Resorts World Las Vegas, one of the north Strip's latest additions

The new acquisition gives Siegel, who controls plenty of real estate around the valley -much of it through the Siegel Suites chain of apartments-, his first property on the Strip itself, and the potential development of his first ground-up casino project.

“It’s very hard to find land like this on the Strip,” he further told Review-Journal, adding that when properties do come up for sale, the asking prices “are so crazy it just doesn’t even make sense.” However, for the time being, there is no timeline to build a project, and the investor may want to wait to see what happens with other sites along the north Strip.

This includes Wynn’s acquisition of 38 acres next to the Fashion Show mall four years ago -no plans for the site have yet been unveiled-, and a Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority-approved sale of 10 acres to Chilean casino mogul Claudio Fischer last year. This, along with $4.3 billion Resorts World’s debut last year, may point to the north Strip finally booming.