A Miami-based investment firm, CGI Merchant Group, is in contract to acquire the hotel lease for the Trump International Hotel, situated less than a mile away from the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue, the people said, who declined to be identified because the matter is private. The transaction is expected to be completed in the first quarter, they said.

The buyer plans to remove the Trump name and reached a deal with Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. to convert the property to a Waldorf Astoria managed by Hilton. The Wall Street Journal reported the agreement earlier Sunday.

Trump won the rights to develop the hotel, located in Washington’s Old Post Office building on Pennsylvania Avenue, in 2012, leasing the building from the federal government. The hotel has been a prized asset for the Trump Organization, and Trump rejected calls to sell the hotel when he was elected president. 

Trump’s company has been engaged in off-and-on efforts to sell the hotel since 2019, when it floated an asking price of more than $500 million, Bloomberg News previously reported. 

The hotel had been a source of consistent controversy, with critics arguing foreign governments and other interest groups could gain favor by booking rooms at a property owned by the former president’s company.

According to documents released by the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, the hotel received about $3.75 million in payments from foreign governments, but still lost more than $70 million during Trump’s time in the White House. The Trump Organization disputed the report.