Vancouver pair look to surpass Intrawest’s $425-million record
Derrick Penner
Sun
Sid Landolt (left) and Peter Dupuis of S&P Destination Properties are selling Donald Trump’s Waikiki tower. Photograph by : Ward Perrin, Vancouver Sun
It’s a long way from hawking resale bungalows out of a basement office in New Westminster to marketing the ultra-luxe Trump Tower Waikiki.
However, not too big a gap for the Vancouver-based partnership of Sid Landolt and Peter Dupuis to bridge with 24-years of experience, a big dose of ambition and — in the words of Landolt — a thirst for seeking out the next new innovation in real estate marketing.
And on Nov. 9, that could all culminate in a record $650-million US sales day for Trump Tower Waikiki, if Landolt and Dupuis’ firm, S&P Destination Properties, hit their goal of selling 80 per cent of project’s 464 units.
That would top previous record-claimer Intrawest Corp.’s $425-million US one-day sell out last December of its Honua Kai resort on Maui.
“The record is less important to us [than] the validation that great international real estate will sell, and sell quickly,” Dupuis said.
Landolt added that the record was also simply “a function of this building presenting itself.”
The 36-storey Trump Waikiki condominium hotel is being developed by Los-Angeles-based property developer Irongate, which hired S&P to sell the project. S&P’s marketing team has been working since April to build a customer base.
Dupuis said they’ve had 8,000 inquires into the project and 1,500 have put down $20,000 US refundable deposits to be first in line. Sales open simultaneously in Waikiki, Tokyo and live online Nov. 9.
Dupuis credited the strength of the Trump brand for the strong interest. He said that when he visited Japan to promote the project, he met with everyone from famous athletes to corporate titans, all curious about what Donald Trump had to offer.
“His fingerprints are on everything here,” Dupuis said of the project. “Donald Trump is the best brander in the world, and he demands results.”
Dupuis and Landolt launched Royal City Realty, in 1982 out of Dupuis’ basement.
They then built a successful Re/Max franchise in New Westminster before moving to project marketing, first with Milborne Real Estate Corp. They got into resort marketing in 1996, founding the firm Sapera Destination Properties in 1996, which they built into the “launch specialist” for Intrawest’s developments.
Dupuis and Landolt sold Sapera to Intrawest in 2004 before launching S&P. S&P, with headquarters on Georgia Street in Vancouver, now has corporate offices in Honolulu and Bangkok.
© The Vancouver Sun 2006
