Oregon Public Broadcasting

The historic hotel once known as the “Waldorf of the West” is now in the hands of a  bank. ShoreBank Pacific bought Hood River’s picturesque Columbia Gorge Hotel Monday at a foreclose auction, as Rob Manning reports.

The sale follows months of uncertainty that started in late January. That’s when the last guests stayed at the Columbia Gorge Hotel before the Oregon landmark closed its doors.

Attempts to sell the hotel before that had failed.

Previous owners, Boyd and Halla Graves, told local papers they nearly sold the Gorge Hotel for ten million dollars, just before it closed.

The Graves tried to get additional financing to keep the hotel going, to no avail.

The hotel was on the auction docket late last month, until the Graves entered Chapter 7 bankruptcy, forcing postponement of the auction.

ShoreBank Pacific submitted the only bid at the foreclosure auction. ShoreBank senior vice president, Adam Monshi, says the bank paid $4 million for the hotel, and is now looking at what to do with it.

Adam Monshi: “We’re not hotel operators, so our intention is to sell the hotel to the right buyer. We understand the hotel is very important to that community, the Hood River community – it’s a historical landmark.”

But Monshi says if the bank  can’t sell the hotel right away, it might try to run it, for a little while.

Adam Monshi: “We are discussing the possibility of opening the hotel. We are also talking to a hotel management company that could run the day-to-day operation.”

Monshi says ShoreBank wants to find “the right buyer.” But he says the bank would also like to sell the hotel for more than the $4 million it paid at auction.